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LITERARY  SHRINES 


BY  DR.  WOLFE 
Uniform  with  this  volume 


A  LITERARY  PILGRIMAGE 

AMONG  THE  HAUNTS  OF  SOME  FAMOUS  BRITISH 
AUTHORS 

Treating  descriptively  and  reminiscently  of  the 
homes  and  resorts  of  English  writers  from  the 
time  of  Chaucer  to  the  present^  and  of  the  scenes 
commemorated  in  their  ivorks 

262  pages.     Illustrated  with  four 
photogravures.  #1.25 


A  LITERARY  PILGRIMAGE  AND  LITERARY  SHRINES 

Two  volumes  in  a  box,  $2.50 


LITERARY 
SHRINES 

THE  HAUNTS  OF  SOME 
FAMOUS  AMERICAN 
AUTHORS 


BY  THEODORE  F.  WOLFE 
M.D.  Ph.D. 

AUTHOR  OF  A  LITERARY  PILGRIMAGE  ETC. 


J,  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 
PHILADELPHIA.  MDCCCXCV 

'Jfl03/loJ    ,.iai8YAW  IHT 


LITERARY 
SHRINES 

THE  HAUNTS  OF  SOME 
FAMOUS  AMERICAN 
AUTHORS 


BY  THEODORE  F.  WOLFE 
M.D.  Ph.D. 

AUTHOR  OF  A  LITERARY  PILGRIMAGE  ETC. 


J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 
PHILADELPHIA.  MDCCCXCV 


Copyright,  1895, 

BY 

Theodore  F.  Wolfe. 


Printed  by  J.  B.  Lippincott  Company,  Philadelphia,  U.S.A. 


TO 


MY  WIFE, 

MY  SYMPATHETIC  AND  APPRECIATIVE 
COMPANION   IN  PILGRIMAGES 
TO  MANY 

LITERARY  SHRINES 


IN  THE   NEW   WORLD   AND  THE  OLD, 
THIS  VOLUME 
IS  AFFECTIONATELY  INSCRIBED. 


PREFACE 


T7*OR  some  years  it  has  been  the  delightful 
privilege  of  the  writer  of  the  present 
volume  to  ramble  and  sojourn  in  the  scenes  amid 
which  his  best-beloved  authors  erst  lived  and 
wrote.  He  has  made  repeated  pilgrimages  to 
most  of  the  shrines  herein  described,  and  has 
been,  at  one  time  or  another,  favored  by  inter- 
course and  correspondence  with  many  of  the 
authors  adverted  to  or  with  their  surviving 
friends  and  neighbors.  In  the  ensuing  pages  he 
has  endeavored  to  portray  these  shrines  in  pen- 
pictures  which,  it  is  hoped,  may  be  interesting 
to  those  who  are  unable  to  visit  them  and  help- 
ful and  companionable  for  those  who  can  and 
will.  If  certain  prominent  American  authors 
receive  little  more  than  mention  in  these  pages, 
it  is  mainly  because  so  few  objects  and  places 
associated  with  their  lives  and  writings  can  now 
be  indisputably  identified :  in  some  instances  the 
writer  has  expended  more  time  upon  fruitless 
quests  for  shrines  which  proved  to  be  non-exist- 
ent or  of  doubtful  genuineness  than  upon  others 
which  are  themes  for  the  chapters  of  this 
booklet. 

T.  F.  W. 


CONTENTS 


THE  CONCORD  PILGRIMAGE 

PAGE 

I.  A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines. 
Abode:  of  Thoreau  —  The  Alcotti  —  Channing  —  Sanborn 
-  Hudson  -  Hoar  -  Wheildon  -  Bartlett  -  The  His- 
toric Common  —  Cemetery  —  Church   17 

II.  The  Old  Manse. 
Abode  of  Dr.  Ripley  —  The  Emersons  —  Hawthorne  — 
Learned  Mrs.  Ripley  -  Its    Famed   Study  and 
Apartments  —Grounds  —Guests  —  Ghosts  —  A  Tran- 
scendental Social  Court   a8 

III.  A  Storied  River  and  Battle-field. 
Where  Zenobia  Drowned  —  Where  Embattled  Farmers 

Fought  -  Thoreau  s  Hemlocks  -  Haunts  of  Haw- 
thorne —  Channing  —  Thoreau  —  Emerson ,  etc.  .   .  39 

IV.  The  Home  of  Emerson. 

An  Intellectual  Capitol  and  Pharos  -  Its  Grounds,  Li- 
brary, and  Literary  Workshop  -  Famous  Rooms 
and  Visitants -Relks  and  Reminiscences  of  the 
Concord  Sage   4.5 

V.  The  Orchard  House  and  its  Neighbors. 
Ellery  Channing-Margaret  Fuller-The  Alcotts-Pro- 
fessor  Harris  -  Summer  School   of  Philosophy  - 
9 


Contents 

PAGB 

Where  Little  Women  was  'written  and  Robert 
Hagburn  lived— Where  Cyril  Norton  was  slain     .  52, 

VI.  Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home. 

Sometime  Abode  of  Alcott—Hanvthorne—Lathrop— Mar- 
garet Sidney  -  Storied  Apartments  -  Hawthorne* s 
Study  -  His  Mount  of  Vision  -  Where  Septimius 
Felton  and  Rose  Garfield  dwelt   58 

VII.  The  Walden  of  Thoreau. 
A  Transcendental  Font-Emerson' s   Garden-Thoreau1 s 
Cove-Cairn-Beanfield-Resort  of  Emerson-Haw- 
thorne-Channing-Hosmer-Alcotty  etc   68 

VIII.  The  Hill-top  Hearsed  with  Pines. 

Last  Resting-Place  of  the  Illustrious  Concord  Company— 

Their  Graves  beneath  the  Piny  Boughs    ....  75 


IN  AND  OUT  OF  LITERARY  BOSTON 

IN  BOSTON 

A  Golden  Age  of  Letters-Literary  Associations- Isms- 
Clubs-Where  Hester  Prynne  and  Silas  Lapham 
lived-The  Corner  Book-store -Home  of  Fields- 
Sargent  -  Hilliard  -  Aldrich  -  Deland -  Parkman  - 
Holmes  -  Howells  -  Moulton  -  Hale  -  Howe  -  Jane 
Austiny  etc   83 

OUT  OF  BOSTON 

I.  Cambridge:  Elmwood:  Mount  Auburn. 
Holmes'  s   Church-yard  -  Bridge  -  Smithy ,  Chapel,  and 

River  of  Long  fellow''  s  Verse-Abodes  of  Lettered 


Contents 

PAGE 

Culture  -  Holmes  -  Higginson  -  Agassi*  -  Norton  - 
Clough  —  Hoivells  —  Fuller  —  Longfellow  —  Lowell- 
Long  fellow' s  City  of  the  Dead  and  its  Precious 
Graves  103 

II.  Belmont  :   The  Wayside  Inn  :   Home  of 
Whittier. 

LowelV s  Beaver  Brook  — Abode  of  Trowbridge  —  Red 
Horse  Tavern-Parsons  and  the  Company  of  Long- 
fellow's Friends-Birthplace  of  Whittier-Scenes  of 
his  Poems— Dwelling  and  Grave  of  the  Countess— 
Powow  Hill  —  Whittier' s  Amesbury  Home  —  His 
Church  and  Tomb  117 

III.  Salem  :    Whittier' s  Oak-Knoll  and  be- 

yond. 

Cemetery  of  Hawthorne' s  Ancestors-Birthplace  of  Haw- 
thorne and  his  Wife  —  Where  Fame  was  won  — 
House  of  the  Seven  Gables— Custom- House- Where 
Scarlet  Letter  was  written  —  Main  Street  and 
Witch  Hill  -  Sights  from  a  Steeple  -  Later  Home 
of  Whittier  —Norman' s  Woe— Lucy  Larcom- Par- 
tony  etc.  —Rivermouth  —  Thaxter  1 28 

IV.  Webster's  Marshfield  :  Brook  Farm,  etc. 
Scenes  of  the  Old  Oaken  Bucket  —  Webster' s  Home  and 

Grave— Where  Emerson  won  his  Wife  — Home  of 
Miss  Peabody -Par kman -Miss  Guiney -Aldrick' s 
Ponkapog  —  Farm  of  Ripley's  Community  —  Relics 
and  Reminiscences  141 


Contents 


IN  BERKSHIRE  WITH  HAWTHORNE 

I.  The  Graylock  and  Hoosac  Region. 
North  Adams  and  about— Hawthorne* s  Acquaintances 
and  Excursions  —  Actors  and  Incidents  of  Ethan 
Brand-Kiln  of  Bertram  the  Lime- Burner-Nat- 
ural Bridge  —  Graylock  —  Thoreau  —  Hoosac  Moun- 
tain-Deerfield  Arch-Williamstoivn-Bryant     .   ,  155 

II.  Lenox  and  Middle  Berkshire. 
Beloved  of  the  Litterateurs-La  Maison  Rouge-Where 
The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables  ivas  •written  — 
Wonder- Book  and  Tangleivood  Scenes— The  Bowl— 
Beechers  Laurel  Lake  -Kemble  -Bryant* s  Monu- 
ment Mountain  -  Stockbridge  -  Catherine  Sedgivick 
-Melville's  Piazza  and  Chimney -Holmes -Long- 
felloiv  -  Pittsfeld  176 


A  DAY  WITH  THE  GOOD  GRAY  POET 

Walk  and  Talk  ivith  Socrates  in  Camden -The  Bard's 
Appearance  and  Surroundings  —  Recollections  of  his 
Life  and  Work  -  Hospital  Service  -  Praise  for  his 
Cri tics-Hi s  Literary  Habit,  Purpose ,  Equipment , 
and  Style-His  Religious  Bent-Readings    ....  201 


T2 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGB 

The  Wayside,  Concord  Fronthpiece. 

The  Thoreau-Alcott  House, — Present  Appearance  .  .  21 

The  Grave  of  Emerson  78 

Where  Longfellow  lived  108 


«3 


HE  CONCORD  PILGRIMAGE 


I.  A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 
Hi  The  Old  Manse 

III.  Storied  River  and  Battle-field 

IV.  The  Home  of  Emerson 

V.  Alcott's  Orchard  House,  etc. 
VI.  Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 
VII.  The  Walden  of  Thoreau 
VIII.  The  Hill-top  Hearsed  with 
Pines 


I 


A  VILLAGE  OF  LITERARY 
SHRINES 


Abodes  of  Thoreau  —  The  Alcottt  —  Chann'ing  —  Sanborn  — 
Hudson  -  Hoar  -  Wheildon  -  Bartlett  -  The  Historic 
Common  —  Cemetery  -  Church. 

TF  to  trace  the  footsteps  of  genius  and  to 
linger  and  muse  in  the  sometime  haunts  of 
the  authors  we  read  and  love,  serve  to  bring  us 
nearer  their  personality,  to  place  us  en  rapport 
with  their  aspirations,  and  thus  to  incite  our 
own  spiritual  development  and  broaden  and 
exalt  our  moral  nature,  then  the  Concord  pil- 
grimage should  be  one  of  the  most  fruitful  and 
beneficent  of  human  experiences.  Familiarity 
with  the  physical  stand-point  of  our  authors, 
with  the  scenes  amid  which  they  lived  and 
wrote,  and  with  the  objects  which  suggested 
the  imagery  of  their  poems,  the  settings  of 
their  tales,  and  which  gave  tone  and  color  to 
their  work,  will  not  only  bring  us  into  closer 
sympathy  with  the  writers,  but  will  help  us  to 
a  better  understanding  of  the  writings. 

A  plain,  straggling  village,  set   in   a  low 
country  amid  a  landscape  devoid  of  any  striking 
beauty  or  grandeur,  Concord  yet  attracts  more 
b  17 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

pilgrims  than  any  other  place  of  equal  size  upon 
the  continent,  not  because  it  holds  an  historic 
battle-field,  but  because  it  has  been  the  dwelling- 
place  of  some  of  the  brightest  and  best  in 
American  letters,  who  have  here  written  their 
books  and  warred  against  creeds,  forms,  and 
intellectual  servitude.  It  is  another  Stratford, 
another  Mecca,  to  which  come  reverent  pil- 
grims from  the  Old  World  and  the  New  to  wor- 
ship at  its  shrines  and  to  wander  through  the 
scenes  hallowed  by  the  memories  of  its  illus- 
trious litterateurs,  seers,  and  evangels.  To  the 
literary  prowler  it  is  all  sacred  ground, — its 
streets,  its  environing  hills,  forests,  lakes,  and 
streams  have  alike  been  blessed  by  the  loving 
presence  of  genius,  have  alike  been  the  theatres 
and  the  inspirations  of  noble  literary  achieve- 
ment. 

Our  way  lies  by  historic  Lexington,  and 
thence,  through  a  pleasant  country  and  by  the 
road  so  fateful  to  the  British  soldiery,  we  ap- 
proach Concord.  It  is  a  placid,  almost  somno- 
lent village  of  villas,  abounding  with  delightful 
lawns  and  gardens,  with  great  elms  shading  its 
old-fashioned  thoroughfares  and  drooping  their 
pliant  boughs  above  its  comfortable  homes. 

Elizabeth  Hoar  has  said,  "  Concord  is  Tho- 
reau's  monument,  adorned  with  inscriptions  by 
18 


A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 


his  hand ;"  of  the  circle  of  brilliant  souls  who 
have  given  the  town  its  world-wide  fame,  he 
alone  was  native  here ;  he  has  left  his  imprint 
upon  the  place,  and  we  meet  some  reminder  of 
him  at  every  turn.  By  the  historic  village  Com- 
mon is  the  quondam  home  of  his  grandfather, 
where  his  father  was  reared,  and  where  the 
"  New  England  Essene"  himself  lived  some 
time  with  the  unmarried  aunt  who  made  the 
ample  homespun  suit  he  wore  at  Walden.  The 
house  of  his  maternal  grandmother,  where  Henry 
David  Thoreau  was  born,  stood  a  little  way  out 
on  a  by-road  to  Lexington,  and  a  daughter  of 
this  home — Thoreau's  winsome  aunt  Louisa 
Dunbar — was  ineffectually  wooed  by  the  famous 
Daniel  Webster.  At  the  age  of  eight  months 
the  infant  Thoreau  was  removed  to  the  village, 
in  which  nearly  the  whole  of  his  life  was  passed. 
Believing  that  Concord,  with  its  sylvan  environ- 
ment, was  a  microcosm  "  by  the  study  of  which 
the  whole  world  could  be  comprehended,"  this 
wildest  of  civilized  men  seldom  strayed  beyond 
its  familiar  precincts.  Alcott  declared  that 
Thoreau  thought  he  dwelt  in  the  centre  of  the 
universe,  and  seriously  contemplated  annexing 
the  rest  of  the  planet  to  Concord. 

On  the  south  side  of  the  elm-shaded  Main 
street  of  the  village  we  find  a  pleasant  and  com- 
19 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


fortable,  old-fashioned  wooden  dwelling, — the 
home  which,  in  his  later  years,  the  philosopher, 
poet,  and  mystic  shared  with  his  mother  and 
sisters.  About  it  are  great  trees  which  Thoreau 
planted ;  a  stairway  and  some  of  the  partition 
walls  of  the  house  are  said  to  have  been  erected 
by  him.  In  the  second  story  of  an  extension  at 
the  back  of  the  main  edifice,  some  of  the  family 
worked  at  their  father's  trade  of  pencil-making. 
In  the  large  room  at  the  right  of  the  entrance, 
afterward  the  sitting-room  of  the  Alcotts,  some 
of  Thoreau's  later  writing  was  done,  and  here, 
one  May  morning  of  1862,  he  breathed  out  a 
life  all  too  brief  and  doubtless  abbreviated  by 
the  storms  and  drenchings  endured  in  his  pan- 
theistic pursuits.  In  this  house  Thoreau's  "  spir- 
itual brother,"  John  Brown  of  Osawatomie,  was 
a  welcome  guest,  and  more  than  one  wretched 
fugitive  from  slavery  found  shelter  and  protec- 
tion. From  his  village  home  Thoreau  made, 
with  the  poet  Ellery  Channing,  the  journey 
described  in  his  "  Yankee  in  Canada,"  and  sev- 
eral shorter  "  Excursions," — shared  with  Ed- 
ward Hoar,  Channing,  and  others, — which  he 
has  detailed  in  the  delightful  manner  which  gives 
him  a  distinct  position  in  American  literature. 

After  the  removal  of  Sophia,  the  last  of 
Thoreau's  family,  his  friend  Frank  B.  Sanborn 
20 


The  Thoreau-Alcott  House 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


fortable,  old-fashioned  wooden  dwelling, — the 
home  which,  in  his  later  years,  the  philosopher, 
pPH,  and  mystic  shared  with  his  mother  and 
sisters.  About  it  are  great  trees  which  Thoreau 
planted ;  a  stairway  and  some  of  the  partition 
walls  of  the  house  are  said  to  have  been  erected 
by  him.  In  the  second  story  of  an  extension  at 
the  back  of  the  main  edifice,  some  of  the  family 
worked  at  their  father's  trade  of  pencil-making. 
In  the  large  room  at  the  right  of  the  entrance, 
afterward  the  sitting-room  of  the  Alcotts,  some 
of  Thoreau's  later  writing  was  done,  and  here, 
one  May  morning  of  1862,  he  breathed  out  a 
life  all  too  brief  and  doubtless  abbreviated  by 
the  storms  and  drenchings  endured  in  his  pan- 
theistic pursuits.  In  this  house  Thoreau's  "  spir- 
itual brother,"  John  Brown  of  Osawatomie,  was 
a  welcome  guest,  and  more  than  one  wretched 
fugitive  from  slavery  found  shelter  and  protec- 
tion. From  his  village  home  Thoreau  made, 
with  the  poet  Ellery  Channing,  the  journey 
described  in  his  "  Yankee  in  Canada,"  and  sev- 
eral shorter  w  Excursions," — shared  with  Ed- 
ward Hoar,  Channing,  and  others, — which  he 
has  detailed  in  the  delightful  manner  which  gives 
him  a  distinct  position  in  American  literature. 
After  the  fe^vai™?>fA#£pta«T        jast  0f 

Thoreau 's  family,  his  friend  Frank  B.  Sanborn 

20 


A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 

occupied  the  Thoreau  house  for  some  years,  and 
then  it  became  the  home  of  the  Alcott  family. 
Here  Mrs.  Alcott,  the  "  Marmee"  of  "  Little 
Women,"  died ;  here  Bronson  Alcott  was  stricken 
with  the  fatal  paralysis ;  here  commenced  the 
malady  which  contributed  to  the  death  of  his 
illustrious  daughter  Louisa ;  here  lived  "  Meg," 
the  mother  of  the  "  Little  Men"  and  widow  of 
"John  Brooke"  of  the  Alcott  books;  and  here 
now  lives  her  son,  while  his  brother,  "  Demi- 
John,"  dwells  just  around  the  corner  in  the  next 
street.  In  the  room  at  the  left  of  the  hall, 
fitted  up  for  her  study  and  workshop,  Louisa 
Alcott  wrote  some  of  the  tales  which  the  world 
will  not  forget.  An  added  apartment  at  the 
right  of  the  sitting-room  was  long  the  sick-room 
of  the  Orphic  philosopher  and  the  scene  of 
Louisa's  tender  care.  Here  the  writer  saw  them 
both  for  the  last  time :  Alcott  helpless  upon  his 
couch,  his  bright  intelligence  dulled  by  a  veil  of 
darkness ;  the  daughter  at  his  bedside,  sedulous 
of  his  comfort,  devoted,  hopeful,  helpful  to  the 
end.  A  cherished  memento  of  that  interview 
is  a  photograph  of  the  Thoreau-Alcott  mansion, 
made  by  one  of  the  "  Little  Men,"  and  presented 
to  the  writer,  with  her  latest  book,  by  "Jo"  her- 
self. The  front  fence  has  since  been  removed, 
and  the  illustration  shows  the  present  view. 

21 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


In  Thoreau's  time,  a  modest  dwelling,  with  a 
low  roof  sloping  to  the  rear, — now  removed  to 
the  other  side  of  the  street, — stood  directly  op- 
posite his  home,  and  was  for  some  time  the 
abode  of  his  friend  and  earliest  biographer,  the 
sweet  poet  William  Ellery  Channing.  Thoreau 
thought  Channing  one  of  the  few  who  under- 
stood "  the  art  of  taking  walks,"  and  the  two 
were  almost  constant  companions  in  saunterings 
through  the  countryside,  or  in  idyllic  excursions 
upon  the  river  in  the  boat  which  Thoreau  kept 
moored  to  a  riverside  willow  at  the  foot  of 
Channing's  garden.  The  beneficent  influence 
of  their  comradeship  is  apparent  in  the  work  of 
both  these  recluse  writers,  and  many  of  the 
most  charming  of  Channing's  stanzas  are  either 
inspired  by  or  are  poetic  portrayals  of  the  scenes 
he  saw  with  Thoreau, — the  "  Rudolpho"  and  the 
"  Idolon"  of  his  verse.  Thoreau's  last  earthly 
u  Excursion"  was  with  this  friend  to  Monadnoc, 
where  they  encamped  some  days  in  i860.  To 
this  home  of  Channing  came,  in  1855,  Sanborn, 
who  was  welcomed  to  Concord  by  all  the  lit- 
erary galaxy,  and  quickly  became  a  familiar 
associate  of  each  particular  star.  To  go  swim- 
ming together  seems  to  have  been,  among  these 
earnest  and  exalted  thinkers,  the  highest  evidence 
of  mutual  esteem,  and  so  favored  was  Sanborn 
22 


A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 


that  he  is  able  to  record,  "  I  have  swum  with 
Alcott  in  Thoreau's  Cove,  with  Thoreau  in  the 
Assabet,  with  Channing  in  every  water  of  Con- 
cord." 

In  this  home  Sanborn  entertained  John  Brown 
on  the  eve  of  his  Virginia  venture  ;  here  escap- 
ing slaves  found  refuge ;  here  fugitives  from  the 
Harper's  Ferry  fight  were  concealed ;  here  San- 
born was  arrested  for  supposed  complicity  in 
Brown's  abortive  schemes,  and  was  forcibly 
rescued  by  his  indignant  neighbors.  This 
modest  dwelling  gave  place  to  the  later  residence 
of  Frederic  Hudson,  the  historian  of  journalism, 
who  here  produced  many  of  his  contributions  to 
literature.  Professor  Folsom,  of  "  Translations 
of  the  Four  Gospels,"  and  the  popular  authoress 
Mrs.  Austin  have  also  lived  in  this  neighbor- 
hood. 

For  some  years  Sanborn  had  a  famous  select 
school  on  a  street  back  of  Thoreau's  house,  not 
far  from  the  recent  hermit-home  of  his  friend 
Channing,  at  whose  request  Hawthorne  sent 
some  of  his  children  to  this  school,  in  which 
Emerson's  daughter — the  present  Mrs.  Forbes — 
was  a  beloved  pupil,  and  where,  also,  the  daugh- 
ters of  John  Brown  were  for  some  time  placed. 

A  few  rods  westward  from  his  former  dwell- 
ing we  find  Sanborn  in  a  tasteful  modern  villa, — 
23 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

spending  life's  early  autumn  among  his  books. 
He  abounds  with  memories  of  his  friends  of  the 
by-gone  time,  and  his  reminiscences  and  biog- 
raphies of  some  of  them  have  largely  employed 
his  pen  in  his  pleasant  study  here. 

Some  time  ago  the  sweet  singer  Channing 
suffered  in  his  hermitage  a  severe  illness,  which 
prompted  his  appreciative  friend  Sanborn  to  take 
him  into  his  own  home ;  so  we  find  two  sur- 
viving witnesses  or  participants  in  the  moral, 
intellectual,  and  political  renaissance  dwelling 
under  the  same  roof.  In  the  kindly  atmosphere 
of  this  home,  the  shy  poet — who  in  his  age  is 
more  recluse  than  ever,  and  scarce  known  to  his 
neighbors — so  far  regained  physical  vigor  that 
he  has  resumed  his  frequent  visits  to  the  Boston 
library,  long  time  a  favorite  haunt  of  his.  The 
world  refused  to  listen  to  this  exquisite  singer, 
and  now  "  his  songs  have  ceased."  He  has  been 
celebrated  by  Emerson  in  the  "  Dial,"  by  Thoreau 
in  his  "  Week,"  by  Hawthorne  in  "  Mosses"  and 
"  Note-Books,"  by  the  generous  and  sympathetic 
Sanborn  in  many  ways  and  places ;  but  even  such 
poems  as  "  Earth-Spirit,"  "  Poet's  Hope,"  and 
"  Reverence"  found  few  readers, — the  dainty 
little  volumes  fewer  purchasers. 

Below  the  Thoreau-Alcott  house  on  the  vil- 
lage street  was  a  prior  home  of  Thoreau,  from 
*4 


A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 


which  he  made,  with  his  brother,  the  voyage 
described  in  his  "  Week  on  the  Concord  and 
Merrimac  Rivers,"  and  from  which,  in  superb 
disdain  of  "  civilization"  and  social  convention- 
alities, he  went  to  the  two  years*  hermitage  of 
«  Walden." 

Nearly  opposite  the  earlier  residence  of  the 
stoic  is  the  home  of  the  Hoars,  where  lived 
Thoreau's  comrade  Edward  Hoar,  and  Edward's 
sister, — styled  "  Elizabeth  the  Wise"  by  Emer- 
son, of  whom  she  was  the  especial  friend  and 
favorite,  having  been  the  fiancee  of  his  brother 
Charles,  who  died  in  early  manhood.  The 
adjacent  spacious  mansion  was  long  the  home 
of  Wheildon,  the  historian,  essayist,  and  pam- 
phleteer. Nearer  the  village  Common  lived 
John  A.  Stone,  dramatist  of  "  The  Ancient 
Briton"  and  of  the  44  Metamora"  in  which 
Forrest  won  his  first  fame.  In  this  part  of  the 
village  the  eminent  correspondent  "  Warring- 
ton," author  of 44  Manual  of  Parliamentary  Law," 
was  born  and  reared  ;  and  in  Lowell  Street,  not 
far  away,  lives  the  gifted  George  B.  Bartlett,  of 
the  "  Carnival  of  Authors," — poet,  scenic  artist, 
and  local  historian. 

In  the  public  library  we  find  copies  of  the 
printed  works  of  the  many  Concord  authors, 
and  portraits  or  busts  of  most  of  the  writers. 
*5 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


Among  the  treasures  of  the  institution  are  priceless 
manuscripts  of  Curtis,  Motley,  Lowell,  Holmes, 
Emerson,  Hawthorne,  Thoreau,  and  others. 

Among  the  thickly- strewn  graves  on  the  hill- 
side above  the  Common  repose  the  ashes  of 
Emerson's  ancestors ;  about  them  lie  the  fore- 
fathers of  the  settlement, — some  of  them  asleep 
here  for  two  centuries,  reckless  alike  of  the  re- 
sistance to  British  oppression  and  of  the  later 
struggle  for  freedom  of  thought  which  their 
townsmen  have  waged.  A  tree  on  the  Common 
is  pointed  out  as  that  beneath  which  Emerson 
made  an  address  at  the  dedication  of  the  sol- 
diers' monument,  and  Bartlett  records  the  tra- 
dition that  the  grandfather  of  the  Concord  sage 
stood  on  the  same  spot  a  hundred  years  before 
to  harangue  the  "  embattled  farmers"  on  the 
morning  of  the  Concord  fight. 

Near  by  is  the  ancient  church  where  Emer- 
son's ancestors  preached,  and  within  whose 
framework  the  Provincial  Congress  met.  Of 
the  religious  services  here  Emerson  was  always 
a  supporter,  often  an  attendant ;  here  he  some- 
times preached  in  early  manhood  ;  here  his 
children  were  christened  by  the  elder  Channing, 
— "  the  first  minister  he  had  known  who  was  as 
good  as  they;"  here  Emerson's  daughter  is  a 
devout  worshipper. 

z6 


A  Village  of  Literary  Shrines 


The  comparatively  few  of  the  transcendental 
company  who  prayed  within  a  pew  came  to  this 
temple,  but  here  all  were  brought  at  last  for 
funeral  rites :  here  lay  Thoreau  among  his 
thronging  townsmen  while  Emerson  and  Bron- 
son  Alcott  made  their  touching  eulogies  and 
Ellery  Channing  read  a  dirge  in  a  voice  almost 
hushed  with  emotion ;  here  James  Freeman 
Clarke,  who  had  married  Hawthorne  twenty- 
two  years  before,  preached  his  funeral  sermon 
above  the  lifeless  body  which  bore  upon  its 
breast  the  unfinished  "  Dolliver  Romance  be- 
fore the  pulpit  here  lay  the  coffined  Emerson, — 
"  his  eyes  forever  closed,  his  voice  forever  still," 
— while  a  vast  concourse  looked  upon  him  for 
the  last  time,  and  his  neighbor  Judge  Hoar  pro- 
nounced one  of  the  most  impressive  panegyrics 
that  ever  fell  from  human  lips,  and  the  devoted 
Alcott  read  a  sonnet. 


27 


II 

THE  OLD  MANSE 


Abode  of  Dr.  Ripley  -  The  Emersons  -  Hawthorne  -  Learned 
Mrs.  Ripley-Its  Famed  Study  and  Apartments-Grounds- 
Guests-Ghosts-A  Transcendental  Social  Court. 

NORTHWARD  from  the  village  Common, 
a  delightful  stroll  along  a  shaded  highway, 
less  secluded  now  than  when  Hawthorne  "  daily 
trudged"  upon  it  to  the  post-office  or  trundled 
the  carriage  of  "  baby  Una,"  brings  us  to  the 
famous  "  Old  Manse"  about  which  he  culled  his 
"  Mosses." 

This  antique  mansion  was  first  tenanted  by 
Ralph  Waldo  Emerson's  grandsire,  and  next  by 
Dr.  Ezra  Ripley,  who  married  the  previous 
occupant's  widow  and  became  guardian  of  her 
children, — born  under  its  roof, — of  whom  Emer- 
son's father  was  one.  When  his  father  died 
Emerson  found  a  secondary  home  here  with  Dr. 
Ripley.  The  Manse  was  again  the  abode  of 
Emerson  and  his  mother  in  1834-35,  when  he 
here  wrote  his  first  volume.  In  1842,  the  year 
following  the  demise  of  the  good  Dr.  Ripley, 
the  Manse  was  profaned  by  its  first  lay  occupant, 
Nathaniel  Hawthorne.  He  brought  here  his 
bride,  lovely  Sophia  Peabody  (who,  with  the 
28 


The  Old  Manse 


gifted  Elizabeth  and  Mrs.  Horace  Mann,  formed 
a  famous  triune  sisterhood),  and  for  four  years 
lived  here  the  ideal  life  of  which  his  "  Note- 
Books"  and  "  Mosses"  give  us  such  delicious 
glimpses.  Hawthorne's  landlord,  Samuel  Ripley, 
was  related  to  the  George  Ripley  with  whom 
Hawthorne  had  recently  been  associated  at 
Brook  Farm.  He  was  uncle  of  Emerson,  and 
preached  his  ordination  sermon ;  was  himself 
reared  in  the  old  Manse,  and  succeeded  Haw- 
thorne as  resident  there.  His  widow,  born 
Sarah  Bradford,  and  celebrated  as  "  the  most 
learned  woman  ever  seen  in  New  England,"  the 
close  friend  of  Emerson  and  of  the  brilliant 
Concord  company,  survived  here  until  1876. 
She  made  a  valuable  collection  of  lichens,  and 
sometimes  trained  young  men  for  Harvard  Uni- 
versity. Conway  records  that  a  savant  called 
here  one  day  and  found  her  hearing  at  once  the 
lesson  of  one  student  in  Sophocles  and  that  of 
another  in  Differential  Calculus,  while  rocking 
her  grandchild's  cradle  with  one  foot  and  shell- 
ing peas  for  dinner.  The  place  is  now  owned 
by  her  daughters,  who  reside  in  Cambridge,  and 
is  rented  in  summer. 

It  is  little  changed  since  the  time  Emerson's 
ancestor  hurried  thence  to  the  gathering  of  his 
parishioners  by  his  church-door  before  the  Con- 
*9 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

cord  battle, — still  less  changed  since  the  halcyon 
days  when  the  great  wizard  of  romance  dwelt — 
the  M  most  unknown  of  authors" — within  its 
shades.  It  is  still  the  unpretentious  Eden,  "  the 
El  Dorado  for  dreamers,"  which  so  completely 
won  the  heart  of  the  sensitive  Hawthorne. 

The  picturesque  old  mansion  stands  amid 
greensward  and  foliage,  its  ample  grounds  di- 
vided from  the  highway  by  a  low  wall.  The 
gate-way  is  flanked  by  tall  posts  of  rough-hewn 
stone,*  whence  a  grass-grown  avenue,  bordered 
by  a  colonnade  of  overarching  trees,  leads  to  the 
house.  Within  the  scattered  sunshine  and  shade 
of  the  avenue,  a  row  of  stone  slabs  sunken  in  the 
turf  like  gravestones  paves  the  path  paced  by 
Ripley,  Emerson,  and  Hawthorne  as  they  pon- 
dered and  planned  their  compositions.  Of  the 
trees  aligned  upon  either  side,  some,  gray-li- 
chened  and  broken,  are  survivors  of  Hawthorne's 
time ;  others  are  set  to  replace  fallen  patriarchs 
and  keep  the  stately  lines  complete.  At  the 
right  of  the  broad  allee  and  extending  away  to 
the  battle-ground  is  the  field,  waving  now  with 
lush  grass,  where  Hawthorne  and  Thoreau 
found  the  flint  arrow-heads  and  other  relics  of 
an  aboriginal  village.  Upon  the  space  which 
skirts  the  other  side  of  the  avenue,  Hawthorne 
had  the  garden  which  engaged  so  much  of  his 
3° 


The  Old  Manse 


time  and  thought,  and  where  he  produced  for 
us  abundant  crops  of  something  better  than  his 
vegetables.  Here  his  Brook-Farm  experience 
was  useful.  Passing  neighbors  would  often  see 
the  darkly-clad  figure  of  the  recluse  hoeing  in 
this  "  patch,"  or,  as  often,  standing  motionless, 
gazing  upon  the  ground  so  fixedly  and  so  long 
—  sometimes  for  hours  together  —  that  they 
thought  him  daft.  Of  the  delights  of  summer 
mornings  spent  here  with  his  peas,  potatoes, 
and  squashes,  he  gives  us  many  glimpses  in  his 
record  of  that  happy  time ;  but  the  "  Note- 
Books"  show  us,  alas !  that  this  simple  pleasure 
was  not  without  alloy,  for,  although  his  "  gar- 
den flourished  like  Eden,"  there  are  hints  of 
"weeds,"  next  "more  weeds,"  then  a  "fero- 
cious banditti  of  weeds"  with  which  "  the 
other  Adam"  could  never  have  contended. 
But  a  greater  woe  came  with  the  foes  who 
menaced  his  artistic  squashes, — "  the  uncon- 
scionable squash-bugs,"  "  those  infernal  squash- 
bugs,"  against  which  he  must  "  carry  on  con- 
tinual war."  For  the  moments  that  we  con- 
template the  scene  of  his  entomic  warfare,  the 
greater  battle-field,  a  few  rods  away,  seems 
hardly  more  impressive.  Few  of  the  trees 
which  in  Hawthorne's  time  stood  nearest  the 
house  remain ;  the  producers  of  the  peaches 
3« 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

and  "  thumping  pears"  have  gone  the  way  of 
all  trees.  So  has  Dr.  Ripley's  famous  willow 
— celebrated  in  Emerson's  and  Channing's  exqui- 
site verse  and  in  Hawthorne's  matchless  prose 
— which  veiled  the  western  face  of  the  mansion 
and  through  which  Hawthorne's  study-windows 
peeped  out  upon  orchard,  river,  and  mead.  In 
the  orchard  that  has  borne  such  luscious  fruit 
of  fancy,  some  of  the  contorted  and  moss-grown 
trees,  whose  branches  —  "like  withered  hands 
and  arms" — hold  out  the  sweet  blossoms  on  this 
June  day,  are  the  same  that  Hawthorne  pict- 
ures among  his  "  Mosses,"  and  beneath  which 
he  lay  in  summer  reverie.  Few  vines  now 
clamber  upon  the  house-walls,  lilacs  still  grow 
beneath  the  old  study-window,  and  a  tall  mass 
of  their  foliage  screens  a  corner  of  the  venerable 
edifice,  which  time  has  toned  into  perfect  har- 
mony with  its  picturesque  environment.  It  is 
a  great,  square,  wooden  structure  of  two  stories, 
with  added  attic  rooms  beneath  an  overwhelm- 
ing gambrel  roof,  which  is  the  conspicuous 
feature  of  the  edifice  and  contributes  to  its 
antique  form.  The  heavy  roof  settles  down 
close  upon  the  small,  multipaned  windows. 
From  above  the  door  little  convex  glasses,  like 
a  row  of  eyes,  look  out  upon  the  visitor  as  he 
applies  for  admission. 

3* 


The  Old  Manse 


A  spacious  central  hall,  rich  in  antique 
panelling  and  sombre  with  grave  tints,  extends 
through  the  house.  From  its  dusk  and  cool- 
ness we  look  out  upon  the  bright  summer  day- 
through  its  open  doors ;  through  one  we  see 
the  "hill  of  the  Emersons"  beyond  the  high- 
way, the  other  frames  a  pleasing  picture  of 
orchard  and  sward  with  glimpses  of  the  river 
shining  through  its  bordering  shrubbery.  The 
quaint  apartments  are  darkly  wainscoted  and 
low-ceiled,  with  massive  beams  crossing  over- 
head. Some  of  these  rooms  Hawthorne  has 
shown  us.  The  one  at  the  left,  which  the 
novelist  believed  to  have  been  the  sleeping- 
room  of  Dr.  Ripley,  was  the  parlor  of  the 
Hawthornes,  and  —  decked  with  a  gladsome 
carpet,  pictures,  and  flowers  daily  gathered 
from  the  river-bank — Hawthorne  averred  it  was 
"  one  of  the  prettiest  and  pleasantest  rooms  in 
the  whole  world."  To  this  room  then  came 
the  sage  Emerson  "  with  a  sunbeam  in  his 
face  ;"  the  "  cast-iron  man"  Thoreau,  "  long- 
nosed,  queer-mouthed,  ugly  as  sin,"  but  with 
whom  to  talk  f*  is  like  hearing  the  wind  among 
the  boughs  of  a  forest  tree  ;"  Ellery  Channing, 
with  his  wife  and  her  illustrious  sister,  Margaret 
Fuller ;  the  gifted  George  William  Curtis,  then 
tilling  a  farm  not  far  from  the  Manse,  long  be- 
c  33 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


fore  he  lounged  in  an  "  Easy  Chair genial 
Bradford,  relative  of  Ripley,  and  associate  and 
firm  friend  of  Hawthorne ;  Horatio  Bridge,  of 
the  t€  African  Cruiser"  and  of  the  recent  Haw- 
thorne "  Recollections  fhe  critic  George  Hil- 
liard,  at  whose  house  Hawthorne  was  married ; 
"  Prince"  Lowell,  the  large-hearted ;  Franklin 
Pierce,  Hawthorne's  life-long  friend.  Concern- 
ing the  discussion  of  things  physical  and  meta- 
physical, to  which  these  old  walls  then  listened, 
the  host  gives  us  little  hint.  Sometimes  the 
guests  were  "  feasted  on  nectar  and  ambrosia" 
by  the  new  Adam  and  Eve ;  sometimes  they 
"  listened  to  the  music  of  the  spheres  which, 
for  private  convenience,  is  packed  into  a  music- 
box," — left  here  by  Thoreau  when  he  went 
to  teach  in  the  family  of  Emerson's  brother ; 
once  here  before  this  wide  fireplace  they  sat 
late  and  told  ghost  stories, — doubtless  suggested 
by  the  clerical  phantom  whose  sighs  they  used 
to  hear  in  yonder  dusky  corner,  and  whose 
rustling  gown  sometimes  almost  touched  the 
company  as  he  moved  about  among  them.  In 
this  room  Dr.  Ripley  penned,  besides  his 
"  History  of  the  Concord  Fight"  and  "  Treatise 
on  Education,"  three  thousand  of  his  protracted 
homilies, — a  fact  upon  which  Hawthorne  found 
it  "awful  to  reflect," — and  here  in  our  day  the 
34 


The  Old  Manse 


gifted  George  B.  Bartlett  wrote  some  part  of  his 
Concord  sketches,  etc.  Here,  too,  and  in  the 
larger  room  opposite,  the  erudite  and  versatile 
Mrs.  Samuel  Ripley  held  her  social  court  and 
received  the  exalted  Concord  conclave,  with 
other  earnest  leaders  of  thought. 

In  the  front  chamber  at  the  right  Hawthorne's 
first  child,  the  hapless  Una, — named  from  Spen- 
ser's "  Faerie  Queene," — was  born.  Behind  this 
is  the  "  ten-foot-square"  apartment  which  was 
Hawthorne's  study  and  workshop.  Two  win- 
dows of  small,  prismatic-hued  panes  look  into  the 
orchard,  and  upon  one  of  these  Hawthorne  has 
inscribed, — 

"  Nath1.  Hawthorne. 
This  is  his  study,  1843.'* 

Below  this  another  hand  has  graven, — 

"  Inscribed  by  my  husband  at 

Sunset  Apr  3d  1843 
In  the  gold  light    S.  A.  H. 
Man's  accidents  are  God's  purposes. 

Sophia  A.  Hawthorne  1843." 

From  its  north  window,  said  to  have  been  cracked 
by  the  explosions  of  musketry  in  the  conflict,  we 
see  the  battle-field  and  a  reach  of  the  placid  river. 
This  room  had  been  the  study  of  Emerson's 
grandfather ;  from  its  window  his  wife  watched 
35 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

the  light  between  his  undrilled  parishioners  and 
the  British  veterans.  His  daughter  Mary — aunt 
of  our  American  Plato  and  herself  a  gifted  writer 
— used  to  boast  "  she  was  in  arms  at  the  battle," 
having  been  held  up  at  this  window  to  see  the 
soldiery  in  the  highway.  Years  later  Emerson 
himself  came  into  possession  of  this  room,  and 
here  wrote  his  "  Nature,"  antagonizing  many 
of  the  orthodox  tenets.  Perhaps  it  was  well 
for  the  moral  serenity  of  his  ancestor — to  whom 
the  transcendental  movement  would  have  seemed 
arrant  March-madness — that  he  could  not  fore- 
see the  composition  of  such  a  volume  here  within 
the  sanctity  of  his  old  study.  The  book  was 
published  anonymously,  and  Sanborn  says  that 
when  inquiry  was  made,  "  Who  is  the  author 
of  '  Nature  V  "  a  Concord  wit  replied,  "  God 
and  Waldo  Emerson." 

Next,  the  dreamy  Hawthorne  succeeded  to  the 
little  study,  and  here,  with  the  sunlight  glimmer- 
ing through  the  willow  boughs,  he  worked  in 
solitude  upon  his  charming  productions  for  three 
or  four  hours  of  each  day.  Here,  besides  the 
copious  entries  in  his  journals,  he  prepared  most 
of  the  papers  of  his  "  Mosses,"  wrote  many 
articles  for  the  "  Democratic  Review"  and  other 
magazines,  edited  "  Old  Dartmoor  Prisoner"  and 
Horatio  Bridge's  "  African  Cruiser."  It  is  note- 
36 


The  Old  Manse 


worthy  that  the  "  Celestial  Railroad,"  in  which 
Hawthorne  records  his  condemnation  of  the 
spiritual  renaissance  by  substituting  the  "  terrible 
giant  Transcendentalist"  (who  feeds  upon  pil- 
grims bound  for  the  Celestial  City)  in  place  of 
the  Pope  and  Pagan  of  Bunyan's  allegory,  was 
written  in  the  same  room  with  Emerson's  volume, 
which  inaugurated  the  great  transcendental  move- 
ment in  the  Western  World. 

Among  the  recesses  of  the  great  attic  of  the 
Manse  we  may  still  see  the  "  Saints'  Chamber," 
with  its  fireplace  and  single  window ;  but  it  is 
tenanted  by  sprouting  clergymen  no  longer.  The 
atmosphere  of  theological  twilight  and  mustiness 
— acquired  from  generations  of  clerical  inhabit- 
ants— which  pervaded  the  place  in  Hawthorne's 
time  has  been  dissipated  by  the  larger  and  happier 
home-life  of  Mrs.  Samuel  Ripley  and  the  blithe 
and  brilliant  company  that  gathered  about  her 
here.  Dismayed  by  these  beneficent  influences, 
the  ghosts  have  indignantly  deserted  the  man- 
sion: even  the  persistive  clerical,  who  sighed  in 
Hawthorne's  parlor  and  noisily  turned  his  ser- 
mon-leaves in  the  upper  hall,  has  not  disturbed 
the  later  occupants  of  the  Manse. 

One  might  muse  and  linger  long  about  the  old 
place  which,  as  his  "  Mosses"  and  journals  show, 
Hawthorne  made  a  part  of  his  very  life.  Its  air 
37 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


of  antiquity,  its  traditional  associations,  its  se- 
clusion, and  all  its  peaceful  environment  were 
pleasing  to  the  shy  and  susceptible  nature  of  the 
subtle  romancer,  and  accorded  well  with  his 
introspective  habit.  Besides,  it  was  "  the  first 
home  he  ever  had,"  and  it  was  shared  with  his 

new  Eve."  No  wonder  is  it  that  he  could 
here  declare,  "  I  had  rather  be  on  earth  than  in 
the  seventh  heaven,  just  now." 

It  is  saddening  to  remember  that,  from  this 
paradise,  poverty  drove  him  forth. 


38 


Ill 

A  STORIED  RIVER  AND 
BATTLE-FIELD 

Where  Zenobia  Drowned— Where  Embattled  Far  men  Fought 
—  Thoreau' s  Hemlocks-Haunts  of  Haivthorne-Ckanning— 
Thoreau-Emersont  etc. 

T>  EHIND  Hawthorne's  "Old  Manse"— -its 
course  so  tortuous  that  Thoreau  suggested 
for  Concord's  escutcheon  "  a  field  verdant  with 
the  river  circling  nine  times  round,"  so  noise- 
less that  he  likened  it  to  the  "  moccasined  tread  " 
of  an  Indian,  so  sluggish  that  Hawthorne  had 
dwelt  some  weeks  beside  it  before  he  determined 
which  way  its  current  lies — flows  the  Concord, 
"  river  of  peace."  This  placid  stream  is  the 
aboriginal  "  Musketaquid  "  of  Emerson's  poem, 
— sung  of  Thoreau,  Channing,  and  many  another 
bard,  beloved  of  Hawthorne  and  pictured  in  rap- 
turous phrase  in  his  "  Note-Books"  and  "  Mosses 
from  an  Old  Manse."  It  was  the  delightful 
haunt  of  Hawthorne's  leisure,  the  scene  of  the 
occurrence  which  inspired  the  most  thrilling  and 
high-wrought  chapter  of  his  romance. 

A  grassy  path,  shaded  by  orchard  trees,  leads 
from  the  west  door  of  the  Manse  to  the  river's 
margin  at  the  place  where  Hawthorne  kept  his 
39 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

boat  under  the  willows.  The  boat  had  before 
been  the  property  of  Thoreau,  built  by  his  hands 
and  used  by  him  on  the  famous  voyage  described 
in  his  "  Week  on  the  Concord  and  Merrimac 
Rivers."  Hawthorne  named  the  craft  "  Pond- 
Lily,"  because  it  brought  so  many  cargoes  of 
that  beautiful  flower  to  decorate  his  home.  In 
it,  alone  or  accompanied  by  Thoreau  or  Ellery 
Channing,  he  made  the  many  delightful  excur- 
sions he  has  described.  Embarking  on  the 
slumberous  stream,  we  follow  the  course  of  Haw- 
thorne's boat  to  many  a  scene  made  familiar  by 
that  dreamful  romancer  and  by  the  poets  and 
philosophers  of  Concord.  First  to  the  place, 
below  the  bridge  of  the  battle,  where  one  dark 
night  Hawthorne  and  Channing  assisted  in  re- 
covering from  the  water  the  ghastly  body  of  the 
girl-suicide,  an  incident  which  made  a  profoundly 
horrible  impression  upon  the  sensitive  novelist, 
and  which  he  employed  as  the  thrilling  termi- 
nation of  the  tale  of  Zenobia  in  "  The  Blithedale 
Romance," — portraying  it  with  a  tragic  power 
which  has  never  been  surpassed.  Thence  we 
paddle  up  the  placid  stream,  as  it  slumbers  along 
its  winding  course  between  the  meadows,  kisses 
the  tangled  grasses  and  wild  flowers  that  fringe 
jts  margins,  bathes  the  roots  and  boughs  of  the 
elders  and  dwarf  willows  which  overhang  its 
40 


A  Storied  River  and  Battle-Field 


surface  as  if  to  gaze  upon  the  reflections  of  their 
own  loveliness  mirrored  there.  The  reach  of 
river — "  from  Nashawtuc  to  the  Cliff" — above 
the  confluence  of  the  two  branches  was  most 
beloved  and  frequented  of  Thoreau ;  here  he 
sometimes  brought  Emerson,  as  on  that  summer 
evening  when  the  sage's  diary  records,  "  the 
river-god  took  the  form  of  my  valiant  Henry 
Thoreau  and  introduced  me  to  the  riches  of  his 
shadowy,  starlit,  moonlit  stream,"  etc. 

The  deeper  portion  of  the  river  near  the 
Manse  was  Hawthorne's  habitual  resort  for 
bathing  and  fishing,  but  his  longer  solitary 
voyages  and  his  "  wild,  free  days"  with  Ellery 
Channing  were  upon  the  beautiful  and  sheltered 
North  Branch, — the  Assabeth  of  the  "  Mosses," 
— which  flows  into  the  Concord  a  half-mile 
above  the  Manse.  Into  this  branch  we  turn  our 
boat,  and  through  sunshine  and  shade  we  follow 
the  winsome  course  of  the  lingering  stream, 
finding  new  and  delightful  seclusion  at  every 
turn.  A  railway  now  lies  along  one  lofty  bank, 
but  its  unsightliness  is  concealed  by  long  lines  of 
willows  planted  by  the  loving  hands  of  poet  and 
artist, — Bartlett  and  French, — and  the  infre- 
quent trains  little  disturb  the  seclusion  of  the 
place.  Giant  trees,  standing  with  "  their  feet 
fixed  in  the  flood,"  bend  their  bright  foliage 
4i 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

above  the  softly-flowing  stream  and  fleck  its 
surface  with  shadows  ;  pond-lilies  are  still  up- 
borne by  its  dreaming  waters,  and  cardinal 
flowers  bedeck  its  banks ;  its  barer  reaches  are 
ribbons  of  reflected  sky.  The  spot  on  the 
margin  locally  known  as  "  The  Hemlocks,"  and 
noted  by  Hawthorne  as  being  only  less  sacred  in 
his  memory  than  the  household  hearth,  remains 
itself  undisturbed.  Here  a  clump  of  great  ever- 
greens projects  from  the  base  of  the  lofty  bank 
above  and  across  the  stream,  and  forms  on  the 
shore  a  shaded  bower,  carpeted  by  the  brown 
needles  which  have  fallen  through  many  a  year. 
This  was  a  favorite  haunt  of  Hawthorne  and 
Channing  in  blissful  days ;  here  they  prepared 
their  sylvan  noontide  feasts ;  here  they  lounged 
and  dreamed  ;  here  their  *'  talk  gushed  up  like 
the  babble  of  a  fountain."  As  we  recline  in 
their  accustomed  resting-place  beside  the  sighing 
stream,  and  look  up  at  the  azure  heaven  through 
the  boughs  where  erstwhile  often  curled  the 
smoke  of  their  fire,  we  vainly  try  to  imagine 
something  of  what  would  be  the  converse,  merry 
or  profound,  of  such  starry  spirits  amid  such  an 
inspiring  scene,  and  we  more  than  ever  regret 
that  neither  the  gentle  poet  nor  the  subtle  ro- 
mancer has  chosen  to  share  that  converse  with 
his  readers. 

4* 


A  Storied  River  and  Battle-Field 


Long  and  lovingly  we  loiter  in  this  consecrated 
spot,  and  then  slowly  float  back  to  Hawthorne's 
landing-place  by  his  orchard  wall. 

A  few  rods  distant,  at  the  corner  of  his  field, 
is  the  site  of  the  "  rude  bridge  that  arched  the 
flood,"  and  the  first  battle-ground  of  the  Amer- 
ican Revolution.  On  the  farther  side  a  colossal 
minute-man  in  bronze,  modelled  by  the  Concord 
sculptor  French,  surmounts  a  granite  pedestal 
inscribed  with  Emerson's  immortal  epic,  and 
marks  the  spot  where  stood  the  irregular  array 
of  the  "  embattled  farmers"  when  they  here 
"  fired  the  shot  heard  round  the  world."  The 
statue  replaces  a  bush  which  sprang  from  the 
soil  fertilized  by  the  blood  of  Davis,  and  which 
Emerson  imaged  as  the  "  burning  bush  where 
God  spake  for  his  people." 

The  position  of  the  British  regulars  on  the 
hither  shore  is  indicated  by  the  "  votive  stone" 
of  Emerson's  poem, — a  slender  obelisk  of  granite, 
— and  near  it,  close  under  the  wall  of  the  Manse 
enclosure,  is  the  rude  memorial  that  marks  the 
grave  of  the  British  soldiers  who  were  slain  on 
this  spot.  The  current  tradition  that  a  lad  who, 
after  the  battle,  came,  axe  in  hand,  from  the 
Manse  wood-pile,  found  one  of  the  soldiers  yet 
alive  and  dispatched  him  with  the  axe,  was  first 
related  to  Hawthorne  by  James  Russell  Lowell, 
43 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

as  they  stood  together  above  this  grave.  The 
effect  of  this  story  upon  the  feelings  of  the  sus- 
ceptible Hawthorne  is  told  on  a  page  of  "  The 
Old  Manse,"  and — a  score  of  years  later  and  in 
different  shape — is  related  in  the  romance  of 
"  Septimius  Felton." 


44 


IV 

THE  HOME  OF  EMERSON 


An  Intellectual  Capitol  and  Pharos  —  Its  Grounds,  Library, 
and  Literary  Workshop  —  Famous  Rooms  and  Visitants  — 
Relics  and  Reminiscences  of  the  Concord  Sage. 

T^OLLOWING  the  direction  of  the  British 
*■  retreat  from  the  historic  Common,  we 
come,  beyond  the  village,  to  the  modest  mansion 
which  was  for  half  a  century  the  abode  of  the 
princely  man  who  was  not  only  "  the  Sage  of 
Concord,"  but,  in  the  esteem  of  some  contem- 
poraries, "  was  Concord  itself." 

Emerson  declares,  "  great  men  never  live  in  a 
crowd," — "a  scholar  must  embrace  solitude  as 
a  bride,  must  have  his  glees  and  glooms  alone." 
Of  himself  he  says,  "I  am  a  poet  and  must 
therefore  live  in  the  country ;  a  sunset,  a  forest, 
a  river  view  are  more  to  me  than  many  friends, 
and  must  divide  my  day  with  my  books ;"  and 
this  was  the  consideration  which  finally  deter- 
mined his  withdrawal  from  the  storm  and  fret 
of  the  city  to  his  chosen  home  here  by  Walden 
woods  and  among  the  scenes  of  his  childhood. 
It  was  his  retirement  to  this  semi-seclusion  which 
called  forth  his  much-quoted  poem,  "  Good-by, 
proud  world  !  Pm  going  home."  To  him  here 
45 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


came  the  afflatus  he  had  before  lacked,  here  his 
faculties  were  inspirited,  and  here  his  literary 
productiveness  commenced. 

Behind  a  row  of  dense-leaved  horse-chestnuts 
ranged  along  the  highway,  the  quondam  home 
of  Emerson  nestles  among  clustering  evergreens 
which  were  planted  by  Bronson  Alcott  and 
Henry  D.  Thoreau  for  their  friend.  A  copse 
of  pines  sighs  in  the  summer  wind  close  by; 
an  orchard  planted  and  pruned  by  Emerson's 
hands,  and  a  garden  tended  by  Thoreau,  extend 
from  the  house  to  a  brook  flowing  through  the 
grounds  and  later  joining  the  Concord  by  the 
famous  old  Manse ;  beyond  the  brook  lies  the 
way  to  Walden.  At  the  left  of  the  house  is  a 
narrow  open  reach  of  greensward  on  the  farther 
verge  of  which  erst  stood  the  unique  rustic  bower 
— with  a  wind-harp  of  untrimmed  branches  above 
it — which  was  fashioned  by  the  loving  hands  of 
Alcott.  The  mansion  is  a  substantial,  square, 
clapboarded  structure  of  two  stories,  with  hip- 
roofs ;  a  square  window  projects  at  one  side ;  a 
wing  is  joined  at  the  back ;  covered  porches 
protect  the  entrances ;  light  paint  covers  the 
plain  walls  which  gleam  through  the  bowering 
foliage,  and  the  whole  aspect  of  the  place  is  de- 
lightfully attractive  and  home-like.  Its  pleasant 
and  unpretentious  apartments  more  than  realize 
46 


The  Home  of  Emerson 


the  comfortable  suggestion  of  the  exterior.  Ad- 
joining the  hall  on  the  right  is  the  plain,  rectan- 
gular room  which  was  the  philosopher's  library 
and  workshop.  The  cheerful  fireplace  and  the 
simple  furnishings  of  the  room  are  little  changed 
since  he  here  laid  down  his  pen  for  the  last  time  ; 
the  heavy  table  held  his  manuscript,  his  books  are 
ranged  upon  the  shelves,  the  busts  and  portraits 
he  cherished  adorn  the  walls,  his  accustomed 
chair  is  upon  the  spot  where  he  sat  to  write. 

Emerson's  afternoons  were  usually  spent 
abroad,  but  his  mornings  were  habitually  passed 
among  his  books  in  this  small  corner-room — 
"  the  study  under  the  pines" — recording,  in  "  a 
pellucid  style  which  his  genius  made  classic," 
the  truths  which  had  come  to  him  as  he  mused 
by  shadowy  lake  or  songful  stream,  in  deep  wood 
glade  or  wayside  path.  Most  of  all  his  pen  pro- 
duced, of  divinest  poetry,  of  gravest  philosophy, 
of  grandest  thought,  was  minted  into  words  and 
inscribed  in  this  simple  apartment. 

The  adjoining  parlor — a  spacious,  pleasant, 
home-like  room,  furnished  forth  with  many 
mementos  of  illustrious  friends  and  guests — is 
scarcely  less  interesting  than  the  library.  This 
house  was  the  intellectual  capitol  of  the  village  ; 
to  it  freely  came  the  Concord  circle  of  shining 
ones, — Thoreau,  Channing,  Sanborn,  the  Al- 
47 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

cotts,  the  Hoars,— less  frequently,  Hawthorne. 
For  a  long  time  Mrs.  Samuel  Ripley  habitually 
passed  her  Sabbath  evenings  here.  The  Delphic 
Margaret  Fuller,  who  was  as  truly  the  "  blood  of 
transcendentalism"  as  Emerson  "  was  its  brain," 
was  here  for  months  an  honored  guest.  For 
long  periods  Thoreau,  whose  fame  owes  much 
to  Emerson's  generosity,  was  here  an  inmate 
and  intimate.  In  Emerson's  parlor  were  held 
the  more  formal  seances  of  the  Concord  galaxy ; 
here  met  the  short-lived  "  Monday  Evening 
Club,"  which  George  William  Curtis  whimsi- 
cally describes  as  a  '*  congress  of  oracles,"  who 
ate  russet-apples  and  discoursed  celestially  while 
Hawthorne  looked  on  from  his  corner, — "  a 
statue  of  night  and  silence ;"  here  were  held 
many  of  Bronson  Alcott's  famous  ft  conversa- 
tions," as  well  as  those  of  that  disciple  of  Pla- 
tonism,  Dr.  Jones. 

Emerson  belonged  not  to  Concord  only,  but  to 
the  whole  world, — "  his  thought  was  the  thought 
of  Christendom."  To  these  plain  rooms  as  to 
an  intellectual  court  came,  from  his  own  and 
other  lands,  hundreds  famed  in  art,  literature,  and 
politics.  Here  came  Curtis  and  Bartol  to  sit  at 
the  feet  of  the  sage  ;  Charles  Sumner  and  Mon- 
cure  Conway  to  bear  hence — as  one  of  them  has 
said — **  memories  like  those  Bunyan's  pilgrim 
48 


The  Home  of  Emerson 


must  have  cherished  of  the  Interpreter."  Here 
*  came  Theodore  Parker  from  the  fight  for  free 
thought,"  and  Wendell  Phillips  and  John  Brown 
from  the  conflict  for  free  men  ;  here  came  How- 
ells,  bearing  the  line  from  Hawthorne,  "  I  find 
this  young  man  worthy ;"  here  came  Whittier, 
Agassiz,  Hedge,  Longfellow,  Bradford,  Lowell, 
Colonel  Higginson,  Elizabeth  Peabody,  Julia 
Ward  Howe,  as  to  a  fount  of  wisdom  and  purity. 
In  this  unpretentious  parlor  have  gathered  such 
guests  as  Stanley,  Walt  Whitman,  Bret  Harte, 
Henry  James,  Louis  Kossuth,  Arthur  Clough, 
Lord  Amberley,  Jones  Very,  Fredrika  Bremer, 
Harriet  Martineau,  and  many  others  who,  like 
these,  would  have  felt  repaid  for  their  journey 
over  leagues  of  land  and  sea  by  a  hand-clasp 
and  an  hour's  communion  with  the  intellect  that 
has  been  the  beacon  of  thousands  in  mental  dark- 
ness and  storm.  With  these  came  another  class 
of  pilgrims,  the  great  army  of  impracticables, 
"  men  with  long  hair,  long  beards,  long  collars, — 
many  with  long  ears,  each  in  full  chase  after  the 
millennium,"  and  each  intent  upon  securing  the 
endorsement  of  Emerson  for  his  own  pet  scheme. 
The  wonder  is  that  the  little  library  saw  any 
work  accomplished,  so  many  came  to  it  and 
claimed  the  time  of  the  master  ;  for  to  every 
one — scholar,  tradesman,  and  "  crank" — were 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


accorded  his  never-failing  courtesy  and  kindly 
interest.  Any  one  might  be  the  bearer  of  a 
divine  message,  so  he  listened  to  all, — the  most 
uncouth  and  outre  visitant  might  be  the  coming 
man  for  whom  his  faith  waited,  therefore  all 
were  admitted. 

Here  all  were  "  assayed,  not  analyzed." 
Emerson's  habitual  quest  for  only  the  divinest 
traits  and  his  quickened  perception  of  the  best 
in  men  enabled  him  to  recognize  excellencies 
which  were  yet  unseen  by  others.  While  Haw- 
thorne, the  shy  hermit  at  the  Manse,  was  un- 
heeded by  the  world  and  thought  crazed  by  his 
neighbors,  Emerson  knew  and  proclaimed  his 
transcendent  genius.  He  first  recognized  the 
inspiration  of  Ellery  Channing,  and  made  for 
his  exquisite  verse  exalted  claims  which  have 
been  fully  justified,  and  which  the  world  may 
yet  allow.  While  to  others  Henry  Thoreau 
was  yet  only  an  eccentric  egotist,  Emerson  knew 
him  as  a  poet  and  philosopher,  and  made  him 
the  "forest  seer,  the  heart  of  all  the  scene," 
in  his  lyrical  masterpiece  "Wood-Notes."  He 
promptly  hailed  Walt  Whitman  as  a  true  poet 
while  many  of  us  were  yet  wondering  if  it  were 
not  charitable  to  think  him  insane. 

Emerson's  cordiality  won  for  him  the  honor 
which  prophets  rarely  enjoy  in  their  own  country ; 
50 


The  Home  of  Emerson 


the  objects  and  places  once  associated  with  him 
here  are  still  esteemed  sacred  by  his  old  neigh- 
bors. We  find  among  them  at  this  day  many 
who  can  know  nothing  of  his  books,  but  who, 
for  memory  of  his  simple  kindness,  go  far  from 
their  furrow  or  swath  to  show  us  spots  he  loved 
and  frequented  in  woodland  or  meadow,  on 
swelling  hill-side  or  by  winding  river. 

To  his  home  here  Emerson  brought  his  bride 
sixty  years  ago;  here  he  lived  his  fruitful  life 
and  accomplished  his  work  ;  here  he  rose  to  the 
zenith  of  poesy  and  prophecy ;  to  him  here  came 
the  "  great  and  grave  transition  which  may  not 
king  or  priest  or  conqueror  spare  from  here 
his  wife,  lingering  behind  him  in  the  eternal 
march,  went  a  year  or  two  ago  to  rejoin  him  on 
the  piny  hill-top  ;  and  here  his  unmarried  daugh- 
ter— of  "  saint-like  face  and  nun-like  garb  " — 
inhabits  his  home  and  cherishes  its  treasures. 

Emerson's  son  and  biographer  some  time  ago 
relinquished  his  medical  practice  in  Concord, 
and  has  since  devoted  himself  to  art.  He  has  a 
residence  a  mile  or  so  out  of  the  village,  but 
spends  much  of  his  time  abroad.  Last  year  he 
lectured  in  London  upon  the  lives  and  writings 
of  some  of  the  Concord  authors. 


5* 


V 


THE  ORCHARD  HOUSE  AND 
ITS  NEIGHBORS 


Ellery  Channing- Margaret  Fuller  —  The  Alcotti -Professor 
Harris  -  Summer  School  of  Philosophy  -  Where  Little 
Women  was  written  and  Robert  Hagburn  lived  — 
Where  Cyril  Norton  was  slain. 

A  PLAIN  little  cottage  by  the  road,  not  far 
from  Emerson's  home,  was  for  some  time 
the  abode  of  the  companion  of  many  of  his 
rambles  through  the  countryside,  —  the  poet 
Ellery  Channing.  It  was  to  this  simple  dwell- 
ing, as  the  author  of  "  Little  Women"  once  told 
the  writer,  that  Channing  brought  his  young  wife 
— sister  of  Margaret  Fuller — before  the  Alcotts 
had  come  to  live  in  their  hill-side  home  under  the 
wooded  ridge,  and  it  was  here  he  commenced 
the  sequestered  life  so  suited  to  his  nature  and 
tastes. 

Some  of  his  descriptive  poems  of  Concord 
landscapes  were  written  in  this  little  cottage. 
The  scenes  of  one  of  his  earlier  winters  in  the 
neighborhood — when  he  chopped  wood  in  a 
rude  clearing — are  portrayed  in  the  exquisite 
lines  of  his  "  Woodman."  In  those  days  he 
thought  his  poems  "  too  sacred  to  be  sold  for 
5* 


The  Orchard  House  and  its  Neighbors 


money,"  and  they  were  kept  for  his  circle  of 
friends.  Of  the  poet's  modest  home  Miss 
Fuller — that  "  dazzling  woman  with  the  flame 
in  her  heart" — was  a  frequent  inmate ;  it  was 
from  Concord  that  she  went  to  live  in  the  family 
of  Horace  Greeley  in  New  York.  At  the  time 
of  her  visits  at  Channing's  cottage  Thoreau  was 
sojourning  with  Emerson,  and  we  may  be  sure 
that  the  quartette  of  starry  souls,  thus  juxtapose, 
held  much  soulful  and  edifying  converse.  But 
those  of  us  who  deplore  our  lack  of  the  supreme 
transcendental  spirit  which  we  ascribe  to  the 
Concord  circle  may  find  consolation  in  reflect- 
ing that  some  of  this  gifted  company  had  also 
earthly  tastes,  and  found  even  discourse  concern- 
ing the  "  over-soul"  sometimes  tiresome.  The 
"strained  pitch  of  intellectual  intensity"  was, 
upon  occasion,  gladly  relaxed  ;  thus  we  discover 
the  exalted  Channing  sometime  profanely  in- 
viting Hawthorne  — "  the  gentlest  man  that 
kindly  Nature  ever  drew"  —  to  visit  him  in 
Concord,  alluring  the  novelist  with  prospects  of 
strong-waters,  pipes  and  tobacco  without  end, 
and  urging,  as  the  utmost  inducement,  "  Emerson 
is  gone  and  there  is  nobody  here  to  bore  you." 

A  few  furlongs  farther  eastward,  under  the 
high-soaring  elms  of  the  Lexington  road,  we 
53 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

come  to  the  M  Orchard  House"  of  Bronson  Al- 
cott,  "  the  grandfather  of  the  '  Little  Women.' " 
The  tasteful  dwelling  stands  several  rods  back 
from  the  street,  nestling  cosily  at  the  foot  of  a 
pine-crowned  slope,  and  having  a  wide,  sunny- 
outlook  in  front.  Embowered  in  orchards  and 
vines,  and  shaded  by  the  overreaching  arms  of 
giant  elms,  it  seems  a  most  delightful  home  for 
culture  and  contemplative  study.  The  cottage 
itself  is  a  low,  wide,  gabled,  picturesquely  ir- 
regular edifice,  which  our  Pythagorean  mystic 
evolved  from  a  forlorn,  box-like  farm-house 
which  he  found  here  when  he  purchased  the 
place.  The  rustic  fence  he  set  along  the  high- 
way is  replaced  by  an  ambitious  modern  structure. 
On  this  hill-side  Alcott,  the  "  most  transcendent 
of  the  transcendentalists,"  lived  for  nearly  thirty 
years, — but  not  all  of  that  time  in  this  house, — 
coming  here  first  after  the  failure  of  his  "  Fruit- 
lands"  community  in  1845,  and  finally  twelve 
years  later.  Prior  to  this  he  had  been  assisted 
by  Margaret  Fuller  and  Elizabeth  Peabody  in 
his  renowned  Boston  Temple  School,  which  was 
a  failure  in  a  financial  sense  only,  since  it  fur- 
nished a  theme  for  Miss  Peabody's  "  Record  of 
a  School,"  and  Louisa  Alcott's  girlish  recollec- 
tions of  it  provided  her  a  model  for  the  delight- 
ful "  Plumfield"  of  her  books. 

54 


The  Orchard  House  and  its  Neighbors 


Alcott's  treatise  on  "  Early  Education,"  his 
"  Gospels"  and  "  Orphic  Sayings,"  had  been 
published,  and  his  "very  best  contribution  to 
literature" — his  daughter  Louisa — was  also  ex- 
tant before  he  came  to  this  home,  but  it  was  here 
that  his  maturer  works  and  most  of  his  charming 
essays  and  "  Conversations"  were  produced. 

In  this  house  were  held  the  early  sessions  of 
the  Summer  School  of  Philosophy,  of  which 
Alcott  was  the  leading  spirit ;  here  his  daughter, 
the  "Beth"  of  "Jo's"  books,  died.  The  in- 
terior of  the  "  Orchard  House"  is  roomy  and 
quaint  and  abounds  in  surprising  nooks  and  cosy 
recesses.  In  the  corner-room  Louisa  wrote 
"  Little  Women"  and  other  delicious  books ; 
in  the  room  behind  it,  May,  "  our  Madonna," 
— who  died  Madame  Nieriker, — had  her  studio 
and  practised  the  art  which  made  her  famous 
before  her  untimely  end.  In  the  great  attic 
under  the  sloping  roof  the  "  Little  Women" 
acted  the  "  comic  tragedies"  written  by  "  Jo" 
and  "  Meg"  (some  of  them  now  published  in  a 
volume  with  a  "  Foreword"  by  "  Meg")  until 
the  increasing  audiences  of  Concord  children 
caused  the  removal  of  the  mimic  stage  to  the 
big  barn  on  the  hill-side. 

Hawthorne  makes  this  house  the  abode  of 
Robert  Hagburn  in  "  Septimius  Felton."  Along 
55 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


the  brow  of  the  tree-clad  ridge  which  overlooks 
the  place,  and  to  which  Bronson  Alcott  resorted 
for  the  morning  and  evening  view,  the  patriots 
hastened  to  intercept  the  retreat  of  the  British 
troops,  "  blackened  and  bloody."  In  the  de- 
pression of  the  ridge  just  back  of  the  house  we 
find  the  spot  where  "  Septimius  Felton"  shot 
the  young  officer,  Cyril  Norton,  and  buried 
him  under  the  trees.  On  the  grave  here 
"  Septimius"  sat  with  Rose  Garfield  and  the 
half-crazed  Sibyl  Dacy ;  here  grew  the  crimson 
flower  which  he  distilled  in  his  "  elixir  of  im- 
mortality," and  here  Sibyl  came  to  die  after  her 
draught  of  the  compound. 

After  the  removal  of  the  Alcotts  to  the  Tho- 
reau  house  in  the  village,  *<  Apple  Slump" — as 
Louisa  sometimes  called  this  orchard  home — 
became  the  property  and  residence  of  that 
disciple  of  Hegel,  Professor  Harris, — once  prin- 
cipal of  the  Summer  School  of  Philosophy, 
and  now  the  head  of  the  National  Bureau  of 
Education  at  Washington,  —  who  sometimes 
comes  here  in  summer. 

The  "Hillside  Chapel,"  erected  by  Mrs. 
Elizabeth  Thompson,  of  New  York,  for  the 
sessions  of  the  Summer  Philosophers,  is  placed 
among  the  trees  of  the  orchard  adjoining  Alcott's 
old  home.  It  is  a  plain  little  structure  of  wood, 
56 


The  Orchard  House  and  its  Neighbors 


tasteful  in  design,  with  pointed  gables  and  vine- 
draped  porch  and  windows.  Its  embowered 
walls,  unpainted  and  unplastered,  seem  "  scarcely- 
large  enough  to  contain  the  wisdom  of  the  world," 
but  they  have  held  assemblages  of  such  lights  as 
Emerson,  Alcott,  Sanborn,  Bartol,  McCosh,  Hol- 
land, Porter,  Lathrop,  Stedman,  Wilder,  Hedge, 
Dr.  Jones,  Elizabeth  Peabody,  Ward  Howe,  Ed- 
nah  Cheney,  and  other  like  seekers  and  promoters 
of  fundamental  truth. 


57 


VI 

HAWTHORNE'S  WAYSIDE 
HOME. 

Sometime  Abode  of  Alcott-Haivtkornc-Lathrop-Margaret 
Sidney  -  Storied  Apartments  -  Hawthorne1 s  Study  -  His 
Mount  of  Vision  -  Where  Septimius  Felton  and  Rose 
Garfield  dwelt. 

/"\N  the  Lexington  road,  a  little  way  beyond 
the  Orchard  House,  is  the  once  Wayside 
home  of  Hawthorne,  the  dwelling  in  which,  at 
a  tender  age,  Louisa  M.  Alcott  made  her  first 
literary  essay.  It  is  a  curious,  wide,  straggling, 
and  irregular  structure,  of  varying  ages,  heights, 
and  styles.  The  central  gambrel-roofed  portion 
was  the  original  house  of  four  rooms,  described 
as  the  residence  of  "  Septimius  Felton  ;"  other 
rooms  have  been  added  at  different  periods  and 
to  serve  the  need  of  successive  occupants,  until 
an  architecturally  incongruous  and  altogether 
delightful  mansion  has  been  produced.  To  the 
ugly  little  square  house  which  Alcott  found  here 
in  1845  and  christened  "Hillside"  he  added  a 
low  wing  at  each  side,  the  central  gable  in  the 
front  of  the  old  roof,  and  wide  rustic  piazzas 
across  the  front  of  the  wings.  No  additions 
were  made  during  Hawthorne's  first  residence 
58 


Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 


here,  nor  during  the  occupancy  of  Mrs.  Haw- 
thorne's brother,  while  the  novelist  was  abroad  ; 
but  when  Hawthorne  returned  to  it  in  i860, 
with  "  most  of  his  family  twice  as  big  as  when 
they  left,"  he  enlarged  one  wing  by  adding  the 
barn  to  it,  heightened  the  other  side-wing,  erected 
two  spacious  apartments  at  the  back,  and  crowned 
the  edifice  with  a  square  third-story  study,  which, 
with  its  great  chimney  and  many  gables,  overtops 
the  rambling  roofs  like  an  observatory,  and  may 
have  been  suggested  by  the  tower  of  the  Villa 
Montauto,  where  he  wrote  "  The  Marble  Faun." 
No  important  changes  have  been  made  by  the 
subsequent  owners  of  the  place. 

Hawthorne's  widow  left  the  Wayside  in  1868. 
It  was  afterward  occupied  by  a  school  for  young 
ladies ;  then  by  Hawthorne's  daughter  Rose — 
herself  a  charming  writer — with  her  husband, 
the  gifted  and  versatile  George  Parsons  Lathrop ; 
later  it  was  purchased  by  the  Boston  publisher 
Daniel  Lothrop,  and  has  since  been  the  summer 
home  of  his  widow,  who  is  widely  known  as 
"  Margaret  Sidney,"  the  creator  of  "  Five  Little 
Peppers,"  and  writer  of  many  delightful  books. 
Hawthorne  said,  anent  his  visit  to  Abbotsford, 
"  A  house  is  forever  ruined  as  a  home  by  having 
been  the  abode  of  a  great  man," — a  truth  well 
attested  by  the  present  amiable  mistress  of  his 
59 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


own  Wayside,  whose  experience  with  a  legion 
of  unaccredited,  intrusive,  and  often  insolent 
persons  who  come  at  all  hours  of  the  day,  and 
sometimes  in  the  night,  demanding  to  be  shown 
over  the  place,  would  be  more  ludicrous  were  it 
less  provoking. 

Some  details  of  the  interior  have  been  beau- 
tified by  the  aesthetic  taste  of  Mrs.  Lothrop,  but 
an  appreciative  reverence  for  Hawthorne  leads 
her  to  preserve  his  home  and  its  belongings  essen- 
tially unchanged.  At  the  right  of  the  entrance 
is  an  antique  reception-room,  which  was  Haw- 
thorne's study  during  his  first  residence  here,  as 
it  had  long  before  been  the  study  of  "  Septimius 
Felton"  in  the  tale.  It  is  a  low-studded  apart- 
ment with  floor  of  oaken  planks,  heavy  beams 
strutting  from  its  ceiling,  a  generous  fireplace 
against  a  side  wall,  and  with  two  windows  look- 
ing out  upon  the  near  highway.  In  this  room 
Hawthorne  wrote  "  Tanglewood  Tales"  and 
"  Life  of  Franklin  Pierce  ;"  and  here  that  creat- 
ure of  his  imagination,  "  Septimius,"  brooded 
over  his  doubts  and  questions.  Through  yonder 
windows  "  Septimius"  saw  the  British  soldiery 
pass  and  repass ;  above  this  oaken  mantel — now 
artistically  fitted  and  embellished  with  rare  pot- 
tery— he  hung  the  sword  of  the  officer  he  had 
slain ;  before  this  fireplace  he  pored  over  the 
60 


Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 


mysterious  manuscript  his  dying  victim  had 
given  him  ;  on  this  hearth  he  distilled  the  mystic 
potion,  and  here  poor  Sibyl  quaffed  it.  The 
spacious  room  at  the  left,  across  the  hall,  was  at 
first  Hawthorne's  parlor ;  but  after  he  enlarged 
the  dwelling  this  became  the  library,  where  he 
read  aloud  to  the  assembled  family  on  winter 
evenings,  and  where  his  widow  afterward  tran- 
scribed his  "  Note-Books"  for  publication.  The 
sunny  room  above  this  was  the  chamber  of  the 
unfortunate  Una;  Hawthorne's  own  sleeping 
apartment,  on  the  second  floor,  is  entered  from 
the  hall  through  the  narrowest  of  door-ways. 
In  the  upper  hall  a  little  wall-closet  was  the  re- 
pository of  Hawthorne's  manuscripts,  and  here, 
to  the  surprise  of  all,  an  entire  unpublished 
romance  was  found  after  his  death.  From  this 
hall  a  narrow  stairway,  so  steep  that  one  need 
cling  to  the  iron  rail  at  the  side  in  order  to  scale 
it,  ascends  to  Hawthorne's  study  in  the  tower,  a 
lofty  room  with  vaulted  ceiling.  On  one  side 
wall  is  the  Gothic  enclosure  of  the  stairs,  against 
which  once  stood  his  plain  oaken  writing-desk ; 
upon  it  the  bronze  inkstand  he  brought  from 
Italy,  where  it  held  the  ink  for  "  The  Marble 
Faun."  In  this  inkstand,  he  declared,  lurked 
"  the  little  imp"  which  sometimes  controlled  his 
pen.  Attached  to  a  side  of  the  staircase  was  the 
61 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


high  desk  or  shelf  upon  which  he  often  wrote 
standing.  Book-closets  filled  the  corners  at  the 
back,  and  a  little  fireplace  with  a  plain  mantel 
was  placed  between  two  of  the  windows.  Lov- 
ing hands  have  neatly  decorated  the  ceiling,  and 
painted  upon  the  walls  mottoes  commemorative 
of  the  master  who  wrought  here.  The  views 
he  beheld  through  the  windows  of  this  sanctum 
when  he  lifted  his  eyes  from  his  book  or  manu- 
script are  tranquil  and  soothing  :  across  his  roofs 
in  one  direction  he  looked  upon  the  sunny  grass- 
lands of  the  valley ;  in  another  he  saw  placid 
slopes  of  darkly-wooded  hills  and  a  reach  of  the 
elm-bordered  road ;  in  a  third  direction,  smiling 
fields  and  the  vineyards  where  the  famous  Con- 
cord grape  first  grew  met  his  vision  ;  and  through 
his  north  windows  appeared  the  thick  woods 
that  crowned  his  own  hill-top, — so  near  that  he 
u  could  see  the  nodding  wild  flowers"  among  the 
trees  and  breathe  the  woodland  odors. 

Local  tradition  declares  that,  to  prevent  intru- 
sion into  this  den,  Hawthorne  habitually  sat 
upon  a  trap-door  in  the  floor,  which  was  the  only 
entrance.  Without  this  precaution  he  found  in 
this  eyrie  the  seclusion  he  coveted,  and  here, 
among  the  birds  and  the  tree-tops,  remote  from 
the  tumult  jof  life  and  above  ordinary  distracting 
influences,  he  could  linger  undisturbed  in  that 
62 


Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 


border-land  between  shadow  and  substance  which 
was  his  delight,  could  evoke  and  fix  upon  his 
pages  the  weird  creatures  of  his  fancy.  Several 
hours  of  each  day  he  passed  here  alone  in  musing 
or  composition,  and  here,  besides  some  papers 
for  the  "  Atlantic,"  he  wrote  "  Our  Old  Home," 
"  Grimshaw's  Secret,"  "  Septimius  Felton,"  and 
the  "  Dolliver  Romance"  fragment.  Years  be- 
fore, Thoreau  told  him,  the  Wayside  had  once 
been  inhabited  by  a  man  who  believed  he  would 
never  die.  The  thus  suggested  idea,  of  a  death- 
less man  associated  with  this  house,  seems  to  have 
clung  to  Hawthorne  in  his  last  years,  and  was 
embodied  in  both  his  later  works, — the  scene  of 
"  Septimius  Felton"  being  laid  here  at  the  Way- 
side. No  one  knew  aught  of  its  composition, 
and  the  author,  rereading  the  tale  in  the  solitude 
of  this  study  and  finding  it  in  some  way  lacking 
the  perfection  of  his  ideal,  laid  it  away  in  his 
closet,  and,  in  weariness  and  failing  health,  com- 
menced and  vainly  tried  to  finish  the  "  Dolliver 
Romance"  from  the  same  materials. 

The  house  is  separated  from  the  highway  by 
a  narrow  strip  of  sward,  out  of  which  grow  elms 
planted  by  Bronson  Alcott  and  clustering  ever- 
greens rooted  by  Hawthorne  himself.  The 
greater  part  of  his  domain  lies  along  the  dark 
slope  and  the  wooded  summit  of  the  ridge  which 
63 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


rises  close  behind  the  house.  At  the  extremity 
of  the  grounds  nearest  the  Orchard  House,  a 
depression  in  the  turf  marks  the  site  of  the  little 
house  where  dwelt  the  Rose  Garfield  of  "  Sep- 
timius."  Hawthorne  planted  sunflowers  in  this 
hollow,  and  Julian,  his  son,  remembers  seeing 
the  novelist  stand  here  and  contemplate  their 
wide  disks  above  the  old  cellar. 

On  the  steep  hill-side  remain  the  rough  terraces 
Alcott  fashioned  when  he  occupied  the  place, 
and  many  of  the  flowering  locusts  and  fruit-trees 
he  and  Thoreau  planted.  Here,  too,  are  the 
sombre  spruces  and  firs  which  Hawthorne  sent 
from  "  Our  Old  Home"  or  planted  after  his 
return,  and  all  are  grown  until  they  overshadow 
the  whole  place  and  fairly  embower  the  house 
with  their  branches.  Along  the  hill-side  are  the 
famous  "  Acacia  path"  of  Mrs.  Hawthorne  and 
other  walks  planned  by  the  novelist,  some  of 
them  having  been  opened  by  him  in  the  last 
summer  of  his  life.  By  one  path,  once  familiar 
to  his  feet,  we  find  our  way  up  the  steep  ascent 
among  the  locusts  to  the  "  Mount  of  Vision," — 
as  Mrs.  Hawthorne  named  the  ridge  to  which 
the  novelist  daily  resorted  for  study  and  medi- 
tation. 

The  hill-top  is  clothed  with  a  tangled  growth 
of  trees  which  hides  it  from  the  lower  world 
64 


Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 

and  renders  it  a  fitting  trysting-place  for  the 
wizard  romancer  and  the  mystic  figures  which 
abound  in  his  tales.  Along  the  brow  we  trace, 
among  the  ferns,  vestiges  of  the  pathway  worn 
by  his  feet.  In  the  safe  seclusion  of  this  spot 
he  spent  delectable  hours,  lying  under  the  trees 
with  a  book  in  his  hands  and  an  unwritten 
book  in  his  thoughts,"  while  the  pines  murmured 
to  him  of  the  mystery  and  shadow  he  loved. 
More  often  he  sat  on  a  rustic  seat  between  yonder 
pair  of  giant  trees,  or  paced  his  foot-path  hour 
after  hour,  as  he  pondered  his  plots  and  worked 
out  the  mystic  details  of  many  romances,  some 
of  them  never  to  be  written.  Walking  here 
with  Fields  he  unfolded  his  design  of  the  "  Dol- 
liver"  tale,  which  he  left  half  told.  Here  he 
composed  the  weird  story  of  "Septimius  Felton," 
while  trudging  on  the  very  path  he  describes  as 
having  been  worn  by  his  hero, — Hawthorne 
himself  habitually  walking,  with  hands  clasped 
behind  him  and  with  eyes  bent  on  the  ground, 
in  the  very  attitude  he  ascribes  to  "  Septimius" 
as  Rose  saw  him  "  treading,  treading,  treading, 
many  a  year,"  on  this  foot-path  by  the  grave  of 
the  officer  he  had  slain.  In  this  refuge  Haw- 
thorne remained  a  whole  day  alone  with  his 
grief,  when  tidings  came  to  him  of  the  loss  of 
his  sister  in  the  burning  of  the  "  Henry  Clay." 
65 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


Here  he  sat  with  Howells  one  memorable  after- 
noon. In  the  last  years  his  wife  was  often  with 
him  here,  sometimes  walking,  but  more  fre- 
quently sitting,  with  him, — as  did  Rose  with 
"  Septimius," — and  looking  out,  through  an 
opening  in  the  foliage  near  the  western  end  of 
his  path,  upon  the  restful  landscape,  not  less 
charming  to-day  than  when  his  eyes  lovingly 
lingered  upon  it.  We  see  the  same  broad,  sun- 
kissed  meadows  awave  with  lush  grass  and  flecked 
with  fleeting  cloud-shadows,  and  beyond,  the  dark 
forests  of  Thoreau's  Walden  and  the  gentle  out- 
lines of  low-lying  hills  which  shut  in  the  valley 
like  a  human  life. 

For  some  months  after  the  election  to  the 
Presidency  of  his  friend  Franklin  Pierce,  the 
Wayside  was  frequented  by  office-seekers ;  but 
ordinarily  Hawthorne  had  few  visitors  besides 
his  Concord  friends.  Fields,  Holmes,  Hilliard, 
Whipple,  Longfellow,  Howells,  Horatio  Bridge, 
the  poet  Stoddard,  Henry  Bright,  came  to  him 
here.  The  visits  of  "  Gail  Hamilton"  (Miss 
Abigail  Dodge),  mentioned  by  Hawthorne  as 
"  a  sensible,  healthy-minded  woman,"  were  es- 
pecially enjoyed  by  him.  His  own  visits  were 
very  infrequent ;  "  Orphic"  Alcott  said  that  in 
the  several  years  he  lived  next  door  Hawthorne 
came  but  twice  into  his  house :  the  first  time  he 
66 


Hawthorne's  Wayside  Home 


quickly  excused  himself  "  because  the  stove  was 
too  hot,"  next  time  "  because  the  clock  ticked 
too  loud." 

The  Wayside  was  the  only  home  Hawthorne 
ever  owned.  To  it  he  came  soon  after  his 
removal  from  the  "  little  red  house"  in  Berk- 
shire, and  to  it  he  returned  from  his  sojourn 
abroad ;  here,  with  failing  health  and  desponding 
spirits,  he  lived  in  the  gloomy  war-days, — writ- 
ing in  his  study  or,  with  steps  more  and  more 
uncertain,  pacing  his  hill-top ;  from  here  he  set 
out  with  his  life-long  friend  Pierce  on  the  last 
sad  journey  which  ended  so  quickly  and  quietly. 


*7 


VII 

THE  WALDEN  OF  THOREAU 


A  Transcendental  Font-Emerson' s  Garden— Thoreau  s  Cove- 
Cairn- Beanfield-  Resort  of  Emerson-Hawthorne— Chan- 
ning-Hosmer-Alcott,  etc. 

/^\NE  long-to-be-remembered  day  we  follow 
the  shady  foot-paths,  once  familiar  to  the 
sublimated  Concord  company,  through  their 
favorite  forest  retreats  to  "  the  blue-eyed  Wal- 
den," — sung  by  many  a  bard,  beloved  by  tran- 
scendental saint  and  seer.  After  a  delightful 
stroll  of  a  mile  or  more,  we  emerge  from  the 
wood  and  see  the  lovely  lakelet  "  smiling  upon 
its  neighbor  pines."  We  find  it  a  half-mile  in 
diameter,  with  bold  and  picturesquely  irregular 
margins  indented  with  deep  bays  and  mostly 
wooded  to  the  pebbles  at  the  water's  edge.  From 
this  setting  of  emerald  foliage  it  scintillates  like 
a  gem :  its  wavelets  lave  a  narrow  pebbly  shore 
within  which  a  bottom  of  pure  white  sand  gleams 
upward  through  the  most  transparent  water  ever 
seen.  At  one  point  where  the  railway  skirts  the 
margin,  the  woods  are  disfigured  with  pavilions 
and  tables  for  summer  pleasure-seekers,  and  a 
farther  wooded  slope  has  recently  been  ravaged 
by  fire ;  but  most  of  the  shore  has  escaped  both 
68 


The  Walden  of  Thoreau 


profanation  and  devastation,  so  that  the  literary 
pilgrim  will  find  the  shrines  he  seeks  little  dis- 
turbed since  the  Concord  luminaries  here  had 
their  haunt. 

From  the  summit  of  the  forest  ledge  which 
rises  from  the  southern  shore,  the  lakelet  seems 
a  foliage-framed  patch  of  the  firmament.  This 
rocky  eminence  affords  a  wide  and  enchanting 
prospect,  and  was  the  terminus  and  object  of 
many  excursions  of  Emerson  and  the  other 
"  Walden-Pond-Walkers,"  as  the  transcendental- 
ists  were  styled  by  their  more  prosy  and  orthodox 
neighbors.  It  was  upon  this  elevation  in  the 
midst  of  a  portion  of  his  estate  which  he  cele- 
brates in  his  poetry  as  «  My  Garden" — whose 
"  banks  slope  down  to  the  blue  lake-edge"— 
that  Emerson  proposed  to  erect  a  lodge  or  retreat 
for  retirement  and  thought.  A  mossy  path,  once 
trodden  almost  daily  by  the  philosopher  and  his 
friends,  brings  us  to  the  beautiful  and  secluded 
cove  where  Emerson  and  Thoreau  kept  a  boat, 
and  where  the  shining  ones  often  came  to  bathe 
in  this  limpid  water.  Ablution  here  seems  to 
have  been  a  sort  of  transcendent  baptism,  and 
many  a  visitor,  eminent  in  art,  thought,  or  let- 
ters, has  boasted  that  he  walked  and  talked  with 
Emerson  in  Walden  woods  and  bathed  with  him 
in  Walden  water.  In  this  romantic  nook  Tho- 
69 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


reau  spent  much  time  during  his  hermitage,  sit- 
ting in  reverie  on  its  banks  or  afloat  on  its  glassy 
surface,  fishing  or  playing  his  flute  to  the  charmed 
perch.  On  the  shore  of  this  cove  he  procured 
the  stones  for  the  foundations  and  the  sand  for 
the  plastering  of  his  cabin.  From  the  water's 
edge  an  obscure  path,  bordered  by  the  wild 
flowers  he  loved,  winds  among  the  murmuring 
pines  up  to  the  site  of  Thoreau's  retreat,  on  a 
gentle  hill-side  which  falls  away  to  the  shore  a 
few  rods  distant.  A  cairn  of  small  stones,  placed 
by  reverent  pilgrims,  stands  upon  or  near  the 
spot  where  he  erected  his  dwelling  at  an  outlay 
of  twenty-eight  dollars  and  lived  upon  an  income 
of  one  dollar  per  month. 

The  hermit  would  hardly  know  the  place  now ; 
his  young  pines  are  grown  into  giants  that  allow 
but  glimpses  of  the  shimmering  lake ;  even  the 
"  potato  hole"  he  dug  under  his  cabin,  whence 
the  squirrels  chirped  at  him  from  beneath  the 
floor  as  he  sat  to  write,  and  where  he  kept  his 
winter  store, — the  "  beans  with  the  weevil  in 
them"  and  the  "  potatoes  with  every  third  one 
nibbled  by  chipmunks," — is  obliterated  and 
overgrown  with  the  glabrous  sumach.  His  near- 
by field,  where  he  learned  to  €*  know  beans"  and 
gathered  relics  of  a  previous  and  aboriginal  race 
of  bean-hoers,  is  covered  by  a  growth  of  pines 
70 


The  Walden  of  Thoreau 


and  dwarf  oaks,  in  places  so  dense  as  to  be  almost 
impassable. 

Some  one  has  said,  "  Thoreau  experienced 
Nature  as  other  men  experience  religion."  Cer- 
tainly the  life  at  Walden,  which  he  depicted  in 
one  of  the  most  fascinating  of  books,  was  in  all 
its  details — whether  he  was  ecstatically  hoeing 
beans  in  his  field  or  dreaming  on  his  door-step, 
floating  on  the  lake  or  rambling  in  forest  and 
field — that  of  an  ascetic  and  devout  worshipper 
of  Nature  in  all  her  moods.  Thoreau  "  built 
himself  in  Walden  woods  a  den"  in  1845, — after 
his  return  from  tutoring  in  the  family  of  Emer- 
son's brother  at  Staten  Island ;  here  he  wrote 
most  of  "  Walden"  and  the  "  Week  on  the 
Concord  and  Merrimac  Rivers,"  and  much  more 
that  has  been  posthumously  published  ;  from  here 
he  went  to  jail  for  refusing  to  pay  a  tax  on  his 
poll,  from  here  he  made  the  excursion  described 
in  "  The  Maine  Woods." 

He  finally  removed  from  Walden  in  the  autumn 
of  1847,  to  reside  in  the  house  of  Emerson  dur- 
ing that  sage's  absence  in  Europe.  An  old  neigh- 
bor of  Thoreau's,  who  had  often  watched  his 
"  stumpy"  figure  as  he  hoed  the  beans,  and  had 
even  once  or  twice  assisted  him  in  that  celestial 
agriculture,  tells  us  that  Thoreau's  hut  was  re- 
moved by  a  gardener  to  the  middle  of  the  bean- 
71 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


field  and  there  occupied  for  some  years.  Later 
it  was  purchased  by  a  farmer,  who  set  it  upon 
wheels  and  conveyed  it  to  his  farm  some  miles 
distant,  where  it  has  decayed  and  gone  to 
pieces. 

In  Concord  it  is  not  difficult  to  identify  the 
personages  associated  with  Thoreau's  life  at 
Walden  Pond  and  referred  to  in  his  book.  The 
"  landlord  and  waterlord"  of  the  domain,  on 
which  Thoreau  was  "a  squatter,"  was  Waldo 
Emerson  ;  the  owner  of  the  axe  which  the  her- 
mit borrowed  to  hew  the  frame  of  his  hut  was 
Bronson  Alcott ;  the  "  honorable  raisers"  of  the 
structure  were  Emerson,  Curtis  the  Nile  "  How- 
adji,"  Alcott,  Hosmer,  and  others ;  the  lady 
who  made  the  sketch  of  the  hermitage  which 
appears  on  the  title-page  of  "  Walden"  was  the 
author's  sister  Sophia.  Of  the  hermit's  visitors 
here,  "  the  one  who  came  oftenest"  was  Emer- 
son ;  "  the  one  who  came  farthest"  was  also  the 
poet  whom  the  hermit  "  took  to  board  for  a 
fortnight,"  Ellery  Channing  ;  the  "  long-headed 
farmer,"  who  had  "  donned  a  frock  instead  of  a 
professor's  gown,"  was  Thoreau's  neighbor  and 
life-long  friend  Edmund  Hosmer,  who  is  cele- 
brated in  the  poetry  of  Emerson  and  Channing ; 
the  "  last  of  the  philosophers,"  the  "  Great 
Looker — great  Expecter,"  who  "  first  peddled 
7» 


The  Walden  of  Thoreau 


wares  and  then  his  own  brains,"  was  Bronson 
Alcott,  who  spent  long  evenings  here  in  converse 
with  the  hermit,  or  in  listening  to  chapters  from 
his  manuscript.  Here  came  Hawthorne  to  talk 
with  his  "  cast-iron  man"  about  trees  and  arrow- 
heads ;  here  came  George  Hilliard  and  James  T. 
Fields,  and  others, — sometimes  so  many  that  the 
hut  would  scarce  contain  them ;  the  only  com- 
plaint heard  from  Thoreau  anent  the  narrow- 
ness of  his  quarters  being  that  there  was  not 
room  for  the  words  to  ricochet  between  him  and 
his  guests.  Here,  too,  came  humbler  visitors, 
hunted  slaves,  who  were  never  denied  the  shelter 
of  the  hermitage  nor  the  sympathy  and  aid  of 
the  hermit. 

Another  generation  of  visitors  comes  now  to 
this  spot, — pilgrims  from  far,  like  ourselves,  to 
the  shrine  of  a  "  stoic  greater  than  Zeno  or 
Xenophanes," — a  man  whose  "  breath  and  core 
was  conscience."  We  linger  till  the  twilight, 
for  the  genius  of  this  shrine  seems  very  near  us 
as  we  muse  in  the  place  where  he  dwelt  incar- 
nate alone  with  Nature,  and  there  is  for  us  a  hint 
of  his  healthful  spirit  in  the  odor  of  his  pines 
and  of  the  wild  flowers  beside  his  path, — a  vague 
whisper  of  his  earnest,  honest  thought  in  the 
murmur  of  the  clustering  boughs  and  in  the  lap- 
ping of  the  wavelets  upon  the  mimic  strand. 
73 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 

We  bring  from  the  shore  a  stone — the  whitest 
we  can  find — for  his  cairn,  and  place  with  it  a 
bright  leaf,  like  those  his  callers  in  other  days 
left  for  visiting  cards  upon  his  door-step,  and  then, 
through  the  wondrous  half-lights  of  the  summer 
evening,  we  walk  silently  away. 


74 


VIII 


THE  HILL-TOP  HEARSED 
WITH  PINES 


Last  Resting-Place  of  the  Illustrious  Concord  Company  -  Their 
Graves  beneath  the  Piny  Boughs. 

T"\URING  Hawthorne's  habitation  of  the 
■"-^  "  Old  Manse"  and  his  first  residence  at 
the  Wayside,  his  favorite  walk  was  to  the 
"  Sleepy  Hollow,"  a  beautifully  diversified 
precinct  of  hill  and  vale  which  lies  a  little 
way  eastward  from  the  village.  His  habitual 
resting-place  here  was  a  pine-shaded  hill-top 
where  he  often  met  Emerson,  Thoreau,  Bron- 
son  Alcott,  Elizabeth  Hoar,  Mrs.  Ripley,  or 
Margaret  Fuller, — for  all  that  sublimated  com- 
pany loved  and  frequented  this  spot.  More 
often  Hawthorne  lounged  and  mused  or  chatted 
here  alone  with  his  lovely  wife.  Their  letters 
and  journals  of  this  period  make  frequent  men- 
tion of  the  walks  to  this  place  and  of  "  our 
castle," — a  fanciful  structure  which,  in  their 
happy  converse  here  under  the  pines,  they 
planned  to  erect  for  their  habitation  on  this 
hill-top.  In  their  pleasant  conceit,  the  terraced 
path  which  skirts  the  verge  of  the  hollow  and 
thence  ascends  the  ridge  was  the  grand  "  chariot- 
75 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


road"  to  their  castle.  This  park  has  become  a 
cemetery, — at  its  dedication  Emerson  made  an 
oration  and  Frank  B.  Sanborn  read  a  beautiful 
ode, — and  on  their  beloved  hill-top  nearly  all  the 
transcendent  company  whom  Hawthorne  used 
to  meet  there,  save  Margaret  Fuller  who  rests 
beneath  the  sea,  lie  at  last  in  "  the  dreamless 
sleep  that  lulls  the  dead." 

First  came  Thoreau,  to  lie  among  his  kindred 
under  the  wild  flowers  and  the  fallen  needles  of 
his  dear  pines,  in  a  grave  marked  now  by  a  simple 
stone  graven  with  his  name  and  age.  Next 
came  Hawthorne  :  with  his  "  half-told  tale"  and 
a  wreath  of  apple-blossoms  from  the  u  Old 
Manse"  resting  on  his  coffin,  and  with  Emerson, 
Longfellow,  Fields,  Ellery  Channing,  Agassiz, 
Hoar,  Lowell,  Whipple,  Alcott,  Holmes,  and 
George  Hilliard  walking  mournfully  by  his  side, 
he  was  borne,  through  the  flowering  orchards 
and  up  the  hill-side  path, — which  was  to  have 
been  his  **  chariot-road," — to  a  grave  on  the  site 
of  the  w  castle"  of  his  fancy  ;  where  his  dearest 
friend  Franklin  Pierce  covered  him  with  flowers 
and  James  Freeman  Clarke  committed  his  mortal 
part  to  the  lap  of  earth.  Alas,  that  the  beloved 
cohabitant  of  his  dream-castle  must  lie  in  death 
a  thousand  leagues  away !  in  no  dream  of  his 
would  such  a  separation  from  her  have  seemed 
76 


The  Hill-top  Hearsed  with  Pines 


possible.  She  tried  to  mark  his  tomb  by  a  leafy 
monument  of  hawthorn  shrubbery,  but  the  rig- 
orous climate  prevented ;  now  a  low  marble, 
inscribed  with  the  one  word  "  Hawthorne," 
stands  at  either  extremity  of  his  grave,  and  a 
glossy  growth  of  periwinkle  covers  the  spot 
where  sleeps  the  great  master  of  American 
romance.  Some  smaller  graves  are  beside  his : 
in  one  lies  a  child  of  Julian  Hawthorne ;  in 
another,  Rose — the  daughter  of  Hawthorne's 
age — laid  the  son  which  her  husband,  Parsons 
Lathrop,  commemorates  in  the  lines  of  '*  The 
Flown  Soul."  Next  Mrs.  Ripley  and  Elizabeth 
Hoar  were  borne  to  this  "  God's  acre,"  and 
then  Emerson — followed  by  a  vast  concourse 
and  mourned  by  all  the  world — was  brought  to 
"  give  his  body  back  to  earth  again,"  in  this 
loved  retreat,  near  Hawthorne  and  his  own 
"  forest-seer"  Thoreau.  A  gigantic  pine  towers 
above  him  here,  and  a  massive  triangular  boulder 
of  untooled  pink  quartz — already  marred  by  the 
vandalism  of  relic-seekers — is  placed  to  mark  the 
grave  of  the  great  •*  King  of  Thought."  It  bore 
no  inscription  or  device  of  any  sort  until  a  few 
months  ago,  when  a  bronze  plate  inscribed  with 
his  name  and  years  and  the  lines — 

**  The  passive  master  lent  his  hand 
To  the  vast  soul  that  o'er  him  planned" — 
77 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


was  set  in  the  rough  surface  of  the  stone.  By 
Emerson  lie  his  wife,  his  mother,  two  children 
of  his  son  and  biographer  Dr.  Emerson,  and  his 
own  little  child, — the  "  wondrous,  deep-eyed 
boy"  whom  Emerson  mourned  in  his  matchless 
"  Threnody." 

"  O  child  of  paradise, 
Boy  who  made  dear  his  father's  home, 
In  whose  deep  eyes 

Men  read  the  welfare  of  the  times  to  come, — 
I  am  too  much  bereft." 

Six  years  after  Emerson,  Bronson  Alcott  and 
his  illustrious  daughter  Louisa  were  laid  here, 
within  a  few  yards  of  Hawthorne  and  the  rest, 
on  a  spot  selected  by  the  ,tf  Beth"  of  the  Alcott 
books  who  was  herself  the  first  to  be  interred  in 
it.  Now  all  the  "  Little  Women"  repose  here 
with  their  parents  and  good  "  John  Brooke," — 
"  Jo"  being  so  placed  as  to  suggest  to  her  biog- 
rapher that  she  is  still  to  take  care  of  parents 
and  sisters  "  as  she  had  done  all  her  life." 

No  other  spot  of  earth  holds  dust  more  pre- 
cious than  does  this  *'  hill-top  hearsed  with 
pines."  We  are  pleased  to  find  the  native 
beauty  of  the  place  little  disturbed, — the  trees, 
the  indigenous  grasses,  ferns,  and  flowers  remain- 
ing for  the  most  part  as  they  were  known  and 
7* 


The  Grave  of  Emerson 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


was  set  in  the  rough  surface  of  the  stone.  By 
Emerson  lie  his  wife,  his  mother,  two  children 
of  his  son  and  biographer  Dr.  Emerson,  and  his 
own  little  child,— the  "wondrous,  deep-eyed 
boy"  whom  E  en  CM  mourned  in  his  matchless 
"  Threnody  " 

"  O  cfa.la  of  paradise, 

<>o  made  dear  his  father's  home, 
In  whose  deep  eyes 

Men  read  the  welfare  of  the  times  to  come, — 
I  am  too  much  bereft.** 

Six  years  after  Emerson,  Bronson  Alcott  and 
his  illustrious  daughter  Louisa  were  laid  here, 
witfiia  a  few  yards  of  Hawthorne  and  the  reatj 
on  a  spot  selected  by  the  "Beth"  of  the  AU*ott 

book*  who  was  herself  the  first  to  be  interred  in 
tt.    Now  all  the  **  Little  Women**  repose  here 
«:  "  :       Brooke," — 

"  Jo"  being  sc  placed  as  to  suggest  to  her  biog- 
that  she  is  still  to  take  care  of  parents 
and  sii  she  had  done  all  her  life." 

V  other  spot  of  earth  holds  dust  more  pre- 
cious than  does  this  m  hill-top  hearsed  with 
pines."  We  are  pleased  to  find  the  native 
beauty  of  the  place  little  disturbed, — the  trees, 
the  indigenous  grasses,  ferns,  and  flowers  remain- 
ing for  the  most  part  as  they  were  known  and 

VI03H3M3    -W)   3VA5lO  3HT 


The  Hill-top  Hearsed  with  Pines 


loved  by  those  who  sleep  beneath  them.  The 
contour  of  the  ground  and  the  foliage  which 
clusters  upon  the  slopes  measurably  shut  out  the 
view  of  other  portions  of  the  enclosure  from 
this  secluded  hill-top,  and,  as  we  sit  by  the  graves 
under  the  moaning  pines,  we  seem  to  be  alone 
with  these  our  dead.  Through  the  boughs  we 
have  glimpses  of  the  motionless  deeps  of  a  sum- 
mer sky  ;  the  patches  of  sunshine  which  illumine 
the  graves  about  us  are  broken  by  foliate  shadows 
sometimes  as  still  as  if  painted  upon  the  turf. 
No  discordant  sound  from  the  haunts  of  men 
disturbs  our  meditations ;  the  silence  is  unbroken 
save  by  the  frequent  sighs  of  the  mourning  pines. 

As  we  linger,  the  pervading  quiet  becomes 
something  more  than  mere  silence,  it  acquires 
the  air  and  sense  of  reserve :  the  impression  is 
borne  into  our  thought  that  these  asleep  here, 
who  once  freely  gave  us  their  richest  and  best, 
are  withholding  something  from  us  now, — some 
newly-learned  wisdom,  some  higher  thought. 
Does  "  an  awful  spell  bind  them  to  silence,"  or 
are  they  vainly  repeating  to  us  in  the  tender 
monotone  of  the  pines  a  message  we  cannot 
hear  or  cannot  bear?  Or  have  they  ceased 
from  all  ken  or  care  for  earthly  things?  Do 
they  no  longer  love  this  once  beloved  spot  ?  Do 
they  not  rejoice  in  the  beauty  of  this  summer 
79 


The  Concord  Pilgrimage 


day  and  the  sunshine  that  falls  upon  their  win- 
dowless  palace  ?  Are  they  conscious  of  our 
reverent  tread  on  the  turf  above  them,  of  our 
low  words  of  remembrance  and  affection  ?  Do 
they  care  that  we  have  come  from  far  to  bend 
over  them  here  ? 

"  For  knowledge  of  all  these  things,  we  must" 
— as  the  greatest  of  this  transcendent  circle  once 
said — "  wait  for  to-morrow  morning." 


80 


Jn  and  out  of  literary 

BOSTON 


In  Boston 

Out  of  Boston 

I.  Cambridge ;  Elmwood,  etc. 
II.  Belmont;      Wayside  Inn; 

Homes  of  Whittier 

III.  The  Salem   of  Hawthorne; 

Whittier's  Oak  Knoll 

IV.  Webster's  Marsh-field ;  Brook 

Farm  and  other  Shrines 


IN  BOSTON 


A  Golden  Age  of  Letters-Literary  Associations- Isms-Clubs— 
Where  Hester  Prynne  and  Silas  Lapham  lived-The 
Corner  Book-store  —  Home  of  Fields-Sargent-Hilliard— 
Aldrich—Deland-Parkman-Holmes-Hoivells  —  Moulton  — 
Hale-Hoive-Jane  Austin ,  etc . 

/^\F  the  cisatlantic  cities  our  "modern 
Athens"  is,  to  the  literary  pilgrim,  the 
most  interesting ;  for,  whatever  may  be  the 
claims  of  other  cities  to  the  present  literary 
primacy,  all  must  concede  that  Boston  was  long 
the  intellectual  capital  of  the  continent  and  its 
centre  of  literary  culture  and  achievement.  If 
the  pilgrim  have  attained  to  middle  life  and  be 
loyal  to  the  literary  idols  of  his  youth,  his  re- 
gard for  the  Boston  of  to-day  must  be  largely 
reminiscential  of  a  past  that  is  rapidly  becoming 
historic ;  for,  of  the  constellation  of  brilliant 
authors  and  thinkers  who  first  gained  for  the 
place  its  pre-eminence  in  letters,  few  or  none 
remain  alive.  The  requirements  of  labor  and 
trade  are  transforming  the  old  streets ;  the  sedate 
and  comfortable  dwellings,  once  the  abodes  or 
the  resorts  of  the  litterateurs,  are  giving  place 
to  palatial  shops  or  great  factories ;  the  neigh- 
borhood where  Bancroft,  Choate,  Winthrop, 
Webster,  and  Edward  Everett  dwelt  within  a 
83 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


few  rods  of  each  other  was  long  ago  surren- 
dered to  merchandise  and  mammon ;  yet  for  us 
the  busy  scenes  are  haunted  by  memories  and 
peopled  by  presences  which  the  spirit  of  trade 
is  powerless  to  exorcise. 

To  tread  the  streets  which  have  daily  echoed 
the  foot-falls  of  the  illustrious  company  who 
created  here  a  golden  age  of  learning  and  cult- 
ure were  alone  a  pleasure,  but  the  city  holds 
many  closer  and  more  personal  mementos  of 
her  dead  prophets,  as  well  as  the  homes  of  a 
present  generation  who  worthily  strive  to  sustain 
her  place  and  prestige. 

Interwoven  with  the  older  Boston  are  literary 
associations  hardly  less  memorable  and  enduring 
than  its  history :  in  the  belfry  of  its  historic 
holy  of  holies — Old  South  Church — was  the 
study  of  the  historian  Dr.  Belknap,  and  the 
dove  that  nested  beneath  the  church-bell  is  pre- 
served in  the  poetry  of  N.  P.  Willis ;  King's 
Chapel,  the  sanctuary  where  the  beloved  Dr. 
Holmes  worshipped  for  so  many  years,  and 
whence  he  was  not  long  ago  sadly  borne  to  his 
burial,  figures  in  the  fiction  of  Fenimore  Cooper  ; 
historic  Copp's  Hill  is  also  a  scene  in  a  tale  of 
the  same  novelist;  the  court-house  occupies  the 
site  of  the  "  beetle-browed"  prison  of  Hester 
Prynne  of  «  The  Scarlet  Letter the  storied  old 
84 


In  Boston 

State-house  marked  the  place  of  her  pillory  ; 
the  theatre  of  the  Boston  Massacre  is  the  scene 
of  the  thrilling  episode  of  Hawthorne's  "  Gray- 
Champion  ;"  his  "  Legends  of  Province  House" 
commemorate  the  ancient  structure  which  stood 
nearly  opposite  the  Old  South  Church ;  the 
Tremont  House,  where  the  "  Jacobins'  Club" 
used  to  assemble  with  Ripley,  Channing,  Theo- 
dore Parker,  Bronson  Alcott,  Peabody,  and  the 
extreme  reformers,  was  the  resort  of  Haw- 
thorne's "  Miles  Coverdale,"  as  it  was  of  the 
novelist  himself,  and  on  the  street  here  he  saw 
"  ragamuffin  Moodie"  of  "  The  Blithedale  Ro- 
mance." On  the  site  of  Bowdoin  School, 
Charles  Sumner  was  born  ;  at  one  hundred  and 
twenty  Hancock  Street  he  lived  and  composed 
the  early  orations  which  made  his  fame  ;  at  num- 
ber one  Exeter  Place,  Theodore  Parker,  the  Vul- 
can of  the  New  England  pulpit,  forged  his  bolts 
and  wrote  the  "  Discourses  of  Religion  ;"  in  Es- 
sex Street  lived  and  wrote  Wendell  Phillips,  at 
thirty-seven  Common  Street  he  died ;  at  thirty- 
one  Hollis  Street  the  gifted  Harriet  Martineau 
was  the  guest  of  Francis  Jackson  ;  at  the  corner 
of  Congress  and  Water  Streets  Lloyd  Garrison 
wrote  and  published  "  The  Liberator."  In  this 
older  city,  antedating  the  luxury  of  the  Back 
Bay  district  of  the  new  Boston,  Mather  wrote 
35 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

the  "  Magnalia,"  Paine  sang  his  songs,  Allston 
composed  his  tales,  Buckminster  wrote  his  homi- 
lies, Bowditch  translated  La  Place's  "  M'ecanique 
celeste."  Here  Emerson,  Motley,  Parkman, 
and  Poe  were  born  ;  here  Bancroft  lived,  Combe 
wrote,  Spurzheim  died.  Here  Maffit,  Chan- 
ning,  and  Pierpont  preached ;  Agassiz,  Phillips, 
and  Lyell  lectured;  Alcott,  Elizabeth  Peabody, 
and  Fuller  taught.  Here  Sargent  wrote  "  Deal- 
ings with  the  Dead,"  Sprague  his  "  Curiosity," 
Prescott  his  "  Ferdinand  and  Isabella here 
Margaret  Fuller  held  the  "  Conversations"  which 
attracted  and  impressed  the  leading  spirits  of  the 
time,  and  Bronson  Alcott  favored  elect  circles 
with  his  Orphic  and  oracular  utterances ;  here 
lived  Melvill,  pictured  in  Holmes's  "  Last  Leaf ;" 
here  Emerson  preached  Unitarianism  "  until  he 
had  carried  it  to  the  jumping-ofF-place,"  as  one  of 
his  quondam  parishioners  avers,  and  here  com- 
menced his  career  as  philosopher  and  lecturer. 
Here,  besides  those  above  mentioned,  Dwight, 
Brisbane,  Quincy,  Ripley,  Graham,  Thompson, 
Hovey,  Loring,  Miller,  Mrs.  Folsom,  and  others 
of  similar  ability  or  zeal,  discoursed  and  wrote 
in  advocacy  of  the  various  reforms  and  "  isms" 
in  vogue  half  a  century  or  more  ago. 

It  has  been  said  that,  according  to  the  local 
creed,  whoso  is  born  in  Boston  needs  not  to  be 
86 


In  Boston 


born  again,  but  some  decades  ago  a  literary 
prowler,  like  ourselves,  discovered  that  "no- 
body is  born  in  Boston,"  the  people  who  have 
made  its  fame  in  letters  and  art  being  usually 
allured  to  it  from  other  places.  This  is  true  in 
less  degree  of  the  present  age,  since  Hale, 
Robert  Grant,  Ballou,— of  "The  Pearl  of 
India," — Bates,  Guiney,  Elizabeth  Stuart  Phelps, 
and  others  are  "  to  the  manor  born  ;"  but,  if  Bos- 
ton has  few  birthplaces,  she  cherishes  the  homes 
and  haunts  of  two  generations  of  adult  intel- 
lectual giants. 

Prominent  among  the  literary  landmarks  is 
the  "  Corner  Book-store" — once  the  shop  of 
the  father  of  Dr.  Clarke — at  School  and  Wash- 
ington Streets,  which,  like  Murray's  in  London, 
has  long  been  the  rendezvous  of  the  litterateurs. 
Here  appeared  the  first  American  edition  of 
"  The  Opium  Eater"  and  of  Tennyson's  poems. 
Here  was  the  early  home  of  the  "  Atlantic," 
then  edited  by  James  T.  Fields,  who  was  the 
literary  partner  of  the  firm  and  the  presiding 
genius  of  the  old  store.  This  lover  of  letters 
and  sympathetic  friend  of  literary  men — always 
kind  of  heart  and  generous  of  hand — drew  to 
him  here  the  foremost  of  that  galaxy  who  first 
achieved  for  America  a  place  in  the  world  of 
letters.  To  this  literary  Rialto,  as  familiar 
87 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


loungers,  came  in  that  golden  age  George  Hil- 
liard,  Emerson,  Ticknor,  Saxe,  Whipple,  Long- 
fellow, Hawthorne,  Lowell,  Agassiz,  the  (( Auto- 
crat," and  the  rest,  to  loiter  among  and  discuss 
the  new  books,  or,  more  often,  to  chat  with  their 
friend  Fields  at  his  desk,  in  the  nook  behind  the 
green  baize  curtain.  The  store  is  altered  some 
since  Fields  left  it ;  the  curtained  back-corner, 
which  was  the  domain  of  the  Celtic  urchin 
"  Michael  Angelo"  and  the  trysting  spot  of  the 
literary  fraternity,  has  given  place  to  shelves 
of  shining  books.  The  side  entrance — used 
mostly  by  the  authors  because  it  brought  them 
more  directly  to  Fields's  desk  and  den — is  re- 
placed by  a  window  which  looks  out  upon  the 
spot  where,  as  we  remember  with  a  thrill, 
Fields  last  shook  Hawthorne's  hand  and  stood 
looking  after  him  as — faltering  with  weakness — 
he  walked  up  this  side  street  with  Pierce  to 
start  upon  the  journey  from  which  he  never 
returned. 

Literary  tourists  come  to  the  store  as  to  a 
shrine :  thus  in  later  years  Matthew  Arnold, 
Cable,  Edmund  Gosse,  Professor  Drummond, 
Dr.  Doyle,  and  others  like  them,  have  visited  the 
old  corner.  Nor  is  it  deserted  by  the  authors 
of  the  day ;  Holmes  was  often  here  up  to  the 
time  of  his  death,  and  the  visitor  may  still  see, 
88 


In  Boston 


turning  the  glossy  pages,  some  who  are  writers 
as  well  as  readers  of  books :  Thomas  Bailey 
Aldrich,  Scudder,  Alger,  Robert  Grant, — whose 
"  Reflections"  and  "  Opinions"  have  been  so 
widely  read, — Miss  Winthrop,  Miss  Jewett, 
Mrs.  Louise  Chandler  Moulton,  and  Mrs.  Coffin 
are  among  those  who  still  come  to  the  familiar 
place.  Near  by,  in  Washington  Street,  Haw- 
thorne's first  romance,  **  Fanshawe,"  was  pub- 
lished in  1828.  From  Fields's  famous  store 
the  transition  to  the  staid  old  mansion  which 
was  long  his  home,  and  in  which  his  widow  still 
lives,  is  easy  and  natural.  We  find  it  pleasantly 
placed  below  the  western  slope  of  Beacon  Hill, 
overlooking  an  enchanting  prospect  of  blue 
waters  and  sunset  skies.  It  is  one  of  those 
dignified,  substantial,  and  altogether  comfortable 
dwellings — with  spacious  rooms,  wide  halls, 
easy  stairways,  and  generous  fireplaces — which 
we  inherit  from  a  previous  generation.  Here 
Fields,  hardly  less  famed  as  an  author  than  as 
the  friend  of  authors,  and  his  gifted  wife — who 
is  still  a  charming  writer — created  in  their  beau- 
tiful home  an  atmosphere  which  attracted  to  it 
the  best  and  highest  of  their  kind,  and  made  it 
what  it  has  been  for  more  than  forty  years,  a 
centre  and  ganglion  of  literary  life  and  interest. 
The  old-fashioned  rooms  are  aglow  with  most 
89 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

precious  memories  and  teem  with  artistic  and 
literary  treasures,  many  of  them  being  souvenirs 
of  the  illustrious  authors  whom  the  Fields  have 
numbered  among  their  friends  and  guests.  The 
letters  of  Dickens,  Hawthorne,  Emerson,  and 
others  reveal  the  quality  of  the  hospitality  of 
this  house  and  show  how  it  was  prized  by  its 
recipients.  For  years  this  was  the  Boston  home 
of  Hawthorne ;  to  it  came  Emerson,  Longfellow, 
and  Whittier  almost  as  freely  as  to  their  own 
abodes ;  here  Holmes,  Lowell,  Charles  Sumner, 
Greene,  Bayard  Taylor,  Joseph  Jefferson,  were 
frequent  guests ;  and  here  we  see  a  quaintly 
furnished  bedchamber  which  has  at  various 
times  been  occupied  by  Dickens,  Trollope, 
Arthur  Clough,  Thackeray,  Charles  Kingsley, 
Matthew  Arnold,  Charlotte  Cushman,  and  others 
of  equal  fame.  Of  the  delights  of  familiar  inter- 
course with  the  starry  spirits  who  frequented  this 
house,  of  their  brilliant  discussions  of  men  and 
books,  their  scintillations  of  wit,  their  sage  and 
sober  words  of  wisdom,  Mrs.  Annie  Fields 
affords  but  tantalizing  hints  in  her  reminiscences 
and  the  glimpses  she  occasionally  allows  us  of 
her  husband's  diary  and  letters.  Fields's  library 
on  the  second  floor — described  as  "  My  Friend's 
Library" — is  a  most  alluring  apartment,  where 
we  see,  besides  the  "Shelf  of  Old  Books"  of 
90 


In  Boston 


which  Mrs.  Fields  gives  such  a  sympathetic  ac- 
count, other  shelves  containing  numerous  curious 
and  uniquely  precious  volumes, — among  them 
the  few  hundreds  of  worn  and  much  annotated 
books  which  constituted  the  library  of  Leigh 
Hunt.  In  this  room  Emerson,  while  awaiting 
breakfast,  wrote  one  of  his  poems,  to  which  the 
hostess  gave  title. 

In  later  years  a  younger  generation  of  writers 
came  to  this  mansion :  Celia  Thaxter  was  a 
frequent  guest ;  the  princess-like  Sarah  Orne 
Jewett,  beloved  by  Whittier  as  a  daughter,  has 
made  it  her  Boston  home ;  Aldrich  comes  to  see 
the  widow  of  his  friend ;  Miss  Preston,  Mrs. 
Ward,  and  other  luminous  spirits  may  be  met 
among  the  company  who  assemble  in  these 
memory-haunted  rooms.  For  several  years 
Holmes  lived  in  the  same  street,  within  a  few 
doors  of  Fields's  house. 

At  number  fifty-four  in  quaint  Pinckney  Street, 
around  the  corner  from  Mrs.  Fields's  and  near 
the  former  residence  of  Aldrich,  we  find  the 
house  in  which  the  brilliant  George  Hilliard 
lived  and  died,  scarcely  changed  since  the  time 
James  Freeman  Clarke  here  married  Hawthorne 
to  the  lovely  Sophia  Peabody. 

Upon  the  opposite  side,  at  number  eleven, 
dwells  Mrs.  E.  P.  Whipple,  widow  of  the  emi- 
91 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


nent  author  and  critic, — herself  a  lady  of  refined 
critical  tastes, — who  keeps  unchanged  the  home 
in  which  her  husband  died.  In  his  lifetime  a 
select  circle  of  friends  usually  assembled  here 
on  Sunday  evenings, — a  circle  in  which  Fields, 
Bronson  Alcott,  Lowell,  Emerson,  Longfellow, 
Holmes,  Sumner,  Clarke,  Dr.  Bartol,  Ole  Bull, 
Lucretia  Hale,  Edwin  Booth,  and  others  of  simi- 
lar eminence  in  letters  or  art  were  included. 
Just  around  the  corner,  in  Louisburg  Square, 
Bronson  Alcott  died  in  the  house  of  his  daughter 
Mrs.  Pratt, — the  **  Meg"  of  Louisa  Alcott's 
books. 

On  Beacon  Hill,  in  the  next — Mount  Vernon 
— street,  we  find  near  the  **  hub  of  the  Hub" 
a  tall,  deep-roomed  dwelling,  surmounted  by  an 
observatory  which  commands  a  charming  view 
of  the  city  and  its  environs,  and  this  is  the  ele- 
gant city  home  of  the  poet,  novelist,  and  prince 
of  conversationalists,  Thomas  Bailey  Aldrich. 
His  library,  full  of  treasures,  is  on  a  lower  floor, 
but  the  study  in  which  he  pens  his  delightful 
compositions  is  high  above  the  distractions  of 
the  world.  As  one  sees  the  author  of  "  Mar- 
jorie  Daw"  and  the  recent  "  Unguarded  Gates" 
among  his  books,  there  is  no  hint  of  his  sixty  years 
in  his  fresh,  ruddy  face,  with  its  carefully  waxed 
moustache,  nor  in  his  sprightly  speech  and  manner. 
92 


In  Boston 


In  the  same  street,  the  spacious  mansion  of 
ex-Governor  Claflin  was  long  a  resort  of  a  wise, 
earnest,  and  dazzling  company  of  sublimated  in- 
tellects. This  house  was  in  later  years  the  usual 
haven  of  Whittier,  the  gentle  Quaker  bard,  during 
his  visits  to  Boston ;  and  here,  protected  by  the 
hostess  from  the  eager  kindness  of  his  numerous 
friends,  he  spent  many  restful  days  when  rest 
was  most  needed. 

Near  by,  on  the  same  hill-side,  the  talented 
authoress  of  "  John  Ward,  Preacher"  inhabits  a 
many-windowed  home  of  sober  brick.  Within, 
we  find  everywhere  evidences  of  the  fastidious 
personality  of  Mrs.  Margaret  Deland.  In  her 
parlors  are  dainty  articles  of  furniture  and  bric- 
a-brac,  wide  fireplaces,  deep  windows  full  of 
flowers,  many  pictures,  many  more  books.  In 
her  study  and  work-room,  her  desk  stands  near 
another  fireplace,  about  it  are  still  more  flowers, 
pictures  and  books  galore ;  here,  not  long  ago, 
that  tragedy  of  selfishness — "  Philip  and  His 
Wife" — was  written. 

At  the  sumptuous  home  of  the  Sargents  in 
«  the  adjoining  street  have  been  held  some  of  the 
seances  of  the  noted  Radical  Club,  in  which,  as 
Mrs.  Moulton  says,  "  somebody  read  a  paper 
and  everybody  else  pulled  it  to  pieces."  At 
these  sessions  such  spirits  as  Emerson,  Bronson 
93 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


Alcott,  Holmes,  Edward  Everett  Hale,  Carl 
Schurz,  the  genial  Colonel  Higginson,  the  serene 
James  Freeman  Clarke,  the  mystic  Dr.  Bartol, — 
who  still  lives  in  retirement  in  his  old  home, — 
and  other  representatives  of  advanced  thought  have 
discussed  the  ethics  of  life  as  well  as  of  letters. 

A  plain  brick  house  of  three  stories  in  the 
same  quiet  street  was  the  abode  of  Francis  Park- 
man's  sister,  where,  after  the  death  of  his  wife, 
the  historian  spent  his  winters,  his  study  here 
being  a  simple  front  room  on  the  upper  floor, 
with  open  fireplace  and  book-lined  walls. 

In  Park  Street,  above  the  Common,  the  ample 
mansion  of  George  Ticknor — the  chronicler  of 
"  Spanish  Literature"  and  the  autocrat  of  liter- 
ary taste — was  during  many  years  a  haunt  of  the 
best  of  Boston  culture.  We  find  its  stately 
walls  still  standing,  but  the  interior  has  been  sur- 
rendered to  the  Philistines. 

On  Beacon  Street,  but  a  door  or  two  removed 
from  the  birthplace  of  Wendell  Phillips,  in  a 
house  whose  number  the  poet-lover  said  he 
"remembered  by  thinking  of  the  Thirty-Nine 
Articles,"  Longfellow  won  Miss  Appleton  to 
be  his  wife.  Just  across  the  Common,  in  Carver 
Street,  Hawthorne's  son  was  born. 

At  many  of  the  homes  here  mentioned  were 
held  the  assemblages  of  the  Ladies'  Social  Club. 
94 


In  Boston 


Among  its  readers  were  Agassiz,  Emerson, 
Greene,  Whipple,  Clarke,  and  E.  E.  Hale.  It 
was  ironically  styled  the  "  Brain  Club,"  and 
died  after  many  years  because,  according  to  one 
ex-member,  "  the  newer  members  brought  into 
it  too  much  Supper  and  Stomach  and  no  Brain 
at  all."  A  successor  has  been  the  Round  Table 
Club,  with  Colonel  Higginson  for  first  president, 
— its  meetings  for  essays  and  discussions  being 
held  in  the  homes  of  its  literary  or  artistic 
members. 

Boston's  Belgravia  occupies  a  district  which 
has  been  reclaimed  from  the  waters  of  the 
"  Back  Bay"  of  the  Charles  River, — on  whose 
shore  Hawthorne  placed  the  shunned  and  iso- 
lated thatched  cottage  of  Hester  Prynne  in 
"  The  Scarlet  Letter,"  and  the  windows  of  many 
of  Boston's  Four  Hundred  overlook  the  same 
delightful  vista  of  water,  hills,  and  western  skies 
which  to  the  sad  eyes  of  Hester  and  little  Pearl 
were  a  daily  vision.  On  the  water  side  of 
Beacon  Street,  within  this  select  region,  is  the 
four-floored,  picturesque  mansion  of  brick — its 
front  embellished  with  a  growth  of  ivy  which 
clusters  about  the  bay-windows — where  not 
long  ago  we  found  the  gentle  and  genial  Holmes 
sitting  among  his  books,  serene  in  the  golden 
sunset  of  life,  happy  in  the  love  of  friends  and 
95 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

in  the  benedictions  of  the  thousands  his  work 
has  uplifted  and  beatified.  The  mansion  is  red- 
olent of  literary  associations,  and  throughout  its 
apartments  were  tastefully  disposed  articles  of 
virtu,  curios,  and  mementos — literary,  artistic,  or 
historic— of  affection  and  regard  from  Holmes's 
many  friends  at  home  and  abroad.  His  study 
was  a  large  room  at  the  back  of  the  house,  occu- 
pying the  entire  width  of  the  second  floor.  Its 
broad  window  commands  a  sweep  of  the  Charles, 
with  its  tides  and  its  many  craft,  beyond  which 
the  poet  could  see,  as  he  said,  Cambridge  where 
he  was  born,  Harvard  where  he  was  educated, 
and  Mount  Auburn  where  he  expected  to  lie  in 
his  last  sleep.  We  last  saw  the  "Autocrat"  in  his 
easy-chair,  among  the  treasures  of  this  apart- 
ment, with  a  portrait  of  his  ancestress  "  Doro- 
thy Q"  looking  down  at  him  from  a  side  wall. 
His  hair  was  silvered  and  his  kindly  face  had 
lost  its  smoothness, — for  he  was  eighty-five 
"  years  young,"  as  he  would  say, — but  his  facul- 
ties were  keen  and  alert,  and,  in  benign  age,  his 
greeting  was  no  less  cordial  and  his  outlook  upon 
men  and  affairs  was  no  less  cheery  and  optimistic 
than  in  the  flush  and  vigor  of  early  manhood. 
In  this  luxurious  study  were  written  several  of 
his  twenty-five  volumes, — "  Over  the  Teacups" 
being  the  most  popular  of  those  produced  here, 
96 


In  Boston 


— and  we  found  him  still  devoting  some  hours 
of  each  day  to  light  literary  tasks,  oftenest  dic- 
tating materials  for  his  memoirs,  which  are  yet 
to  be  published. 

Above  the  study,  and  overlooking  the  river 
on  which  he  used  to  row  and  the  farther  green 
hills,  is  the  chamber  immortalized  in  "  My 
Aviary and  here,  as  he  sat  in  his  favorite 
chair,  surrounded  by  his  family,  death  came  to 
him,  and  his  spirit  peacefully  passed  into  the 
eternal  silence.  Then  the  "  Last  Leaf"  had 
fallen,  to  be  mourned  by  all  the  world. 

A  door  or  two  from  Holmes  sometime  dwelt 
the  versatile  novelist,  poet,  playwright,  and 
"Altrurian  Traveller."  A  popular  print  of 
"  Howells  in  his  Library"  is  an  interior  of  his 
Beacon  Street  house ;  the  view  of  the  glassy 
river-basin,  with  the  roofs  and  spires  of  Cam- 
bridge rising  from  banks  and  bowers  of  foliage 
beyond, — which  he  pictures  from  the  new  house 
of  "  Silas  Lapham"  on  this  street, — is  the  one 
Howells  daily  beheld  from  his  study  window 
here.  His  latest  Boston  home  was  in  the  same 
district  on  the  superb  Commonwealth  Avenue, 
near  the  statue  of  Garrison,  and  here,  in  a  sump- 
tuous, six-storied,  bow-fronted  mansion,  he  wrote 
M  The  Shadow  of  a  Dream"  and  other  widely 
read  books. 

g  97 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


A  modest,  old-fashioned  house  on  Beacon 
Street  has  long  been  the  home  of  the  poet  and 
starry  genius  Julia  Ward  Howe,  writer  of  the 
"  Battle-Hymn  of  the  Republic."  Other  mem- 
bers of  her  singularly  gifted  family  have  so- 
journed here,  and  the  "  home  of  the  Howes" 
has  been  frequented  by  men  and  women  eminent 
for  culture  and  thought  and  for  achievement  in 
literature  or  art. 

In  the  adjacent  Marlborough  Street  recently 
died  the  polished  author  and  orator  Robert  C. 
Winthrop,  and  here,  too,  was  the  home  of  Dr. 
Ellis,  the  friend  of  Lowell's  father. 

Farther  away  in  this  newer  Boston  of  luxury  and 
culture  is  the  charming  and  hospitable  home  of 
the  poet,  essayist,  novelist,  and  critic  Mrs.  Louise 
Chandler  Moulton,  whose  American  admirers 
complain  that  in  late  years  she  remains  too 
much  in  London.  When  at  home,  she  inhabits 
a  delightful  dwelling  which,  from  entrance  to 
attic,  teems  with  pictures,  rare  books,  curios,  and 
other  souvenirs  of  her  many  friends  in  many  lands. 
In  her  library,  where  much  of  "  Garden  of 
Dreams,"  "  Swallow  Flights,"  and  other  books 
was  written,  and  where  more  of  all  "  the  work 
nearest  her  heart"  was  accomplished,  are  pre- 
served many  autograph  copies  of  books  by  re- 
cent writers — several  of  them  dedicated  to  Mrs. 
98 


In  Boston 


Moulton — and  a  priceless  collection  of  letters 
from  illustrious  literary  workers.  In  her  draw- 
ing-rooms one  may  meet  many  of  the  famed 
authors  of  the  day, — Higginson,  Wendell,  Hors- 
ford,  Bynner,  Nora  Perry  of  the  charming 
books  for  girls,  Miss  Conway,  Miss  Louise  Imo- 
gen Guiney,  Mrs.  Howe,  Arlo  Bates,  Adams, 
the  jocosely  serious  Robert  Grant,  and  others 
of  Boston's  newer  lights  of  literature. 

If  we  "  drive  on  down  Washington  Street"  with 
"  Silas  Lapham,"  we  shall  find  in  Chester  Square 
the  M  Nankeen  Square"  where  he  dwelt  in  his 
less  ambitious  days,  and  the  pretty  oval  green 
with  the  sturdy  trees  which  the  worthy  colonel 
saw  grow  from  saplings. 

In  a  pleasant  dwelling  on  the  contiguous  street 
lives  and  works  the  bright  and  busy  Lucretia  P. 
Hale,  sister  of  the  author-divine.  She  was  the 
favorite  scholar  of  Miss  Elizabeth  Peabody  ;  and 
she  has,  through  her  writings  and  her  classes, 
acquired  an  influence  and  discipleship  little 
smaller  than  that  which  Margaret  Fuller  once 
possessed. 

Farther  south,  in  the  Roxbury  district,  we 
seek  the  abode  of  the  famed  author  of  "  The 
Man  without  a  Country."  Sauntering  along 
the  shady  and  delectable  Highland  Street,  we 
interrogate  a  uniformed  guardian  of  the  law,  who 
99 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

heartily  rejoins,  "  Dr.  Hale's  is  a  temple  on 
the  right  a  block  further  on :  and  if  any  man's 
fit  to  live  in  a  temple,  it's  him."  As  we  walk  the 
"  block  further  on"  we  think  that,  however  de- 
fective his  grammar,  the  policeman's  estimate  of 
Hale  is  beyond  criticism  and  agrees  with  that  of 
the  thousands  of  readers  and  friends  of  the  in- 
defatigable author,  lecturer,  preacher,  editor, 
reformer,  and  promoter  of  all  good.  We  find 
the  house — very  like  a  Greek  temple — standing 
back  from  the  street  in  the  midst  of  an  ample 
lawn,  shaded  by  noble  trees  and  decked  with  a 
wealth  of  shrubbery  and  bloom.  The  mansion 
is  a  large  square  edifice,  with  great  dormer-win- 
dows in  its  roofs,  surmounted  by  a  cupola,  and 
having  in  front  a  lofty  portico  upheld  by  heavy 
Ionic  pillars,  between  which  interlacing  wood- 
bine forms  a  leafy  screen.  Within  is  a  wide 
hall,  and  opening  out  of  it  are  generously  pro- 
portioned rooms,  some  of  them  lined  from  floor 
to  ceiling  with  thousands  of  books.  The  study 
is  a  commodious  room,  with  a  "  pamphlet- 
annex"  adjoining  it  on  the  garden  side,  and  is 
crammed  with  book-shelves  and  drawers,  while 
piles  of  books,  magazines,  portfolios,  manu- 
scripts, and  memoranda  are  disposed  on  cases, 
tables,  and  stands  about  the  apartment.  Every- 
thing is  obviously  arranged  for  convenient  and 

IOO 


In  Boston 


ready  use,  and  well  it  may  be  so,  for  this  is  the 
work-room  and  "  thinking-shop"  of  the  hardest- 
working  literary  man  in  America.  The  books 
which  made  his  first  fame  were  written  before 
he  came  to  this  house ;  of  all  the  works  pro- 
duced in  this  study,  the  numerous  poems,  ro- 
mances, histories,  essays,  editorials,  reviews,  dis- 
cussions, translations, — to  say  nothing  of  the 
many  hundreds  of  well-considered  and  carefully 
written  sermons, — we  may  not  here  mention 
even  the  names,  for  no  writer  since  Voltaire  is 
more  fruitful  of  finished  and  masterly  work.  It 
is  notable  that  Hale  regards  "  In  His  Name"  as 
his  best  work  from  a  literary  point  of  view ;  of 
his  other  productions,  he  thinks  some  of  the 
poems  of  the  latest  collection,  "  For  Fifty 
Years,"  as  good  as  anything, — "  always  except- 
ing his  sermons."  Among  the  abundant  treas- 
ures of  his  study,  Hale  has  a  most  interesting 
and  valuable  collection  of  autograph  letters,  of 
which  he  is  justly  proud.  His  father  was 
Nathan  Hale  of  the  Boston  "Advertiser,"  his 
mother  was  sister  to  Edward  Everett  and  herself 
an  author  and  translator,  his  wife  is  niece  to 
Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  his  son  Robert  has 
already  acquired  a  reputation  in  the  domain  of 
letters.  The  doctor  himself  has  been  a  writer 
from  childhood,  his  earliest  contributions  being 
101 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


to  his  father's  paper.  His  illustrious  sister  de- 
clares that  in  their  nursery  days  she  and  her 
brother  used  to  take  their  meals  with  the  "  Ad- 
vertiser" pinned  under  their  chins, — a  practice 
to  which  their  literary  precocity  has  been  at- 
tributed. We  find  Hale  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
three  blithe  and  hopeful,  working  as  much  and 
manifestly  accomplishing  more  than  ever  before. 

A  little  farther  out  on  the  same  street  is  the 
dwelling  where  William  Lloyd  Garrison  spent  his 
last  years,  and  in  this  neighborhood  lived  Mrs. 
Blake,  poet  of  "  Verses  Along  the  Way."  Here 
also  are  the  early  home  of  Miss  Guiney  and  the 
school  to  which  she  was  first  sent, — or  rather 
"  carried  neck  and  heels,"  because  she  refused 
to  walk.  Close  by  we  find  the  pleasant  home 
in  which  Jane  G.  Austin  wrote  some  of  her 
famed  colonial  tales  and  where  she  died  not 
many  months  ago ;  and  in  the  same  delightful 
suburb,  a  half-mile  beyond  Hale's  house,  is  the 
retreat  where  the  beloved  author  of  "  Little 
Women"  breathed  out  her  too  brief  life. 


102 


OUT  OF  BOSTON 
I 

CAMBRIDGE:  ELMWOOD: 
MOUNT  AUBURN 


Holmes's  Church-yard-Bridgey  Smithy,  Chapel,  and  River  of 
Longfellow's  Verse-Abodes  of  Lettered  Culture-Holmes- 
Higginson  -  Agassiz  -  Norton  -  Clcugh-How  ells-Fuller- 
Longfellow-Low  ell  -  Longfellow' s  City  of  the  Dead 
and  its  Precious  Graves. 

/CROSSING  the  Charles  by  "  The  Bridge" 
of  Longfellow's  popular  poem,  a  stroll 
along  elm-shaded  streets  brings  us  to  the  an- 
cient Common  of  Cambridge  and  a  vicinage 
which  has  much  besides  its  historic  traditions 
to  allure  the  literary  pilgrim.  For  centuries 
the  site  of  a  celebrated  college  and  a  conspic- 
uous centre  of  learning,  it  has  long  been  the 
abiding-place  of  representatives  of  the  best  and 
foremost  in  American  culture  and  mental  achieve- 
ment. 

Close  by  the  Common,  and  opposite  the  re- 
mains of  the  elm  beneath  which  Washington 
assumed  the  command  of  the  patriot  army,  stood 
the  old  gambrel-roofed  house  in  which  that 
"  gentlest  of  autocrats,"  Holmes,  was  born  and 
reared,  and  upon  whose  door-post  was  first  dis- 
103 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


played  his  "  shingle,"  on  which  he  whimsically 
proposed  to  inscribe  "  The  Smallest  Fevers 
Thankfully  Received ;"  across  the  college  grounds 
is  the  home-like  edifice  where  lived  the  erudite 
Professor  Felton,  loved  by  Dickens  and  oft  men- 
tioned in  his  letters ;  not  far  away,  at  the  corner 
of  Broadway,  was  the  home  of  Agassiz,  since 
occupied  by  his  son ;  and  a  few  rods  eastward 
is  the  picturesque  residence  of  the  witty  and 
profound  Colonel  Higginson, — poet,  essayist, 
novelist,  and  reformer.  In  the  adjacent  Kirk- 
land  Street  dwelt  the  delightful  Dr.  Estes  Howe, 
brother-in-law  to  Lowell,  with  whom  the  poet 
sometime  lived  and  whom  he  celebrated  as  "  the 
Doctor"  in  the  "  Fable  for  Critics."  Dr.  C.  C. 
Abbott  formerly  lived  in  this  neighborhood,  and 
the  collections  on  which  his  best-known  books 
are  founded  are  preserved  in  the  near-by  Pea- 
body  Museum,  beyond  which  we  find  the  taste- 
ful abode  of  Professor  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  the 
friend  and  literary  executor  of  Lowell.  Near 
the  Common,  too,  dwelt  for  a  year  or  so  that 
rare  poet  Arthur  Clough,  author  of  "  The 
Bothie"  and  "  Qua  Cursum  Ventus ;"  and  the 
sweet  singer  Charlotte  Fiske  Bates — the  intimate 
friend  of  Longfellow — had  her  habitation  in  the 
same  neighborhood.  Opposite  the  southern  end 
of  the  Common  is  the  ancient  village  cemetery 
104. 


Cambridge 


celebrated  in  the  poetry  of  Holmes  and  Long- 
fellow ;  a  little  way  westward,  Howells  lived 
in  a  delightful  rose-embowered  cottage  and 
pleasantly  pictured  many  features  of  the  old 
town  in  the  "  Charlesbridge"  of  his  "  Suburban 
Sketches. "  Two  or  three  furlongs  distant, 
within  the  grounds  of  the  Botanic  Garden,  long 
lived  the  American  Linnaeus,  Professor  Asa 
Gray. 

Of  all  the  Cambridge  thoroughfares,  the  shady 
and  venerable  Brattle  Street,  which  curves  west- 
ward from  the  University  Press,  is  most  interest- 
ing and  attractive.  Near  the  Press  building 
stands  the  historic  Brattle  House, — its  beautiful 
stairway  and  other  antique  features  preserved  by 
the  Social  Club,  to  whom  the  property  now 
belongs, — where  Margaret  Fuller,  the  priestess 
and  queen  of  modern  Transcendentalism,  passed 
much  of  her  youth  and  young  womanhood,  and 
where  her  sister,  wife  to  the  poet  Ellery  Chan- 
ning,  was  reared.  Margaret,  who  is  said  to 
have  stood  for  the  Theodora  of  Beaconsfield's 
"  Lothair,"  first  saw  the  light  in  a  modest  little 
dwelling  in  Main  Street  nearer  the  Boston  bridge, 
and  here  attended  school  with  Holmes  and 
Richard  Henry  Dana ;  but  it  was  in  this  Brattle 
House  that  her  marvellous,  and  in  some  respects 
unique,  intellectual  career  commenced.  Here 
105 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


she  acquired  the  moral  and  mental  equipment 
which  fitted  her  for  leadership  in  the  most  vital 
epoch  of  American  culture  and  thought,  and 
here  she  attracted  and  attached  all  the  wisest  and 
noblest  spirits  within  her  range.  To  her  here 
came  Theodore  Parker,  the  older  Channing, 
Harriet  Martineau,  James  Freeman  Clarke, — the 
earnest,  brilliant,  and  thoughtful  of  all  ages  and 
conditions.  One  noble  soul  who  knew  her  here 
speaks  of  her  friendship  as  a  «'  gift  of  the  gods," 
and  some  eminent  in  thought  and  achievement 
testify  that  they  have  ever  striven  toward  stand- 
ards set  up  for  them  by  her  in  that  early  period 
of  her  residence  here. 

Close  by  Miss  Fuller's  home,  "  under  a 
spreading  chestnut-tree"  at  the  intersection  of 
Story  Street,  stood  the  smithy  of  Pratt,  who  was 
immortalized  by  Longfellow  as  "  The  Village 
Blacksmith."  To  the  poet,  passing  daily  on  the 
way  between  his  home  and  the  college,  the 
"  mighty  man"  at  his  anvil  in  the  shaded  smithy 
was  long  a  familiar  vision.  The  tree — a  horse- 
chestnut — has  been  removed,  the  shop  has  given 
place  to  a  modern  dwelling,  aad  years  ago  the 
worthy  smith  rejoined  his  wife,  "  singing  in 
Paradise." 

A  few  steps  westward  from  the  site  of  the 
smithy  is  the  "  Chapel  of  St.  John"  of  another 
106 


Cambridge 


sweet  poem  of  Longfellow ;  and  just  beyond 
this  we  find,  bowered  by  lilacs  and  environed 
by  acres  of  shade  and  sward,  the  colonial  Cragie 
House,  once  the  sojourn  of  Washington,  but 
holding  for  us  more  precious  associations,  since 
Sparks,  Worcester,  and  Everett  have  lived  within 
its  time-honored  walls,  and  our  popular  poet  of 
grace  and  sentiment  for  near  half  a  century  here 
had  his  home,  and  from  here  passed  into  the  un- 
known. The  picturesque  mansion  wears  the 
aspect  of  an  old  acquaintance,  and  the  interior, 
with  its  princely  proportioned  rooms,  spacious 
fireplaces,  wide  halls,  curious  carvings  and  tiles, 
has  much  that  Longfellow  has  shared  with  his 
readers.  On  the  entrance  door  is  the  ponderous 
knocker ;  a  landing  of  the  broad  stairway  holds 
**  The  Old  Clock  on  the  Stairs ;"  at  the  right  of 
the  hall  is  the  study,  with  its  priceless  memen- 
tos of  the  tender  and  sympathetic  bard  who 
wrought  here  the  most  and  best  of  his  life-work, 
from  early  manhood  onward  into  the  mellow 
twilight  of  sweet  and  benign  age.  Here  is  his 
chair,  vacated  by  him  but  a  few  days  before  he 
died ;  his  desk ;  his  inkstand  which  had  been 
Coleridge's ;  his  pen  with  its  "  link  from  the 
chain  of  Bonnivard the  antique  pitcher  of  his 
"  Drinking  Song the  fireplace  of  "  The  Wind 
over  the  Chimney the  arm-chair  carved  from 
107 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


the  "  spreading  chestnut-tree"  of  the  smithy, 
which  was  presented  to  him  by  the  village  chil- 
dren and  celebrated  in  his  poem  "  From  my 
Arm-Chair. "  About  us  here  are  his  cherished 
books,  his  pictures,  his  manuscripts,  all  his 
precious  belongings,  and  from  his  window  we 
see,  beyond  the  Longfellow  Memorial  Park,  the 
river  so  often  sung  in  his  verse,  "  stealing  on- 
ward, like  the  stream  of  life."  In  this  room 
Washington  held  his  war  councils.  Of  the  many 
intellectual  seances  its  walls  have  witnessed  we 
contemplate  with  greatest  pleasure  the  Wednes- 
day evening  meetings  of  the  "  Dante  Club," 
when  Lowell,  Howells,  Fields,  Norton,  Greene, 
and  other  friends  and  scholars  sat  here  with 
Longfellow  to  revise  the  new  translation  of 
Dante. 

The  book-lined  apartment  over  the  study —  . 
once  the  bedchamber  of  Washington  and  later 
of  Talleyrand — was  occupied  by  Longfellow 
when  he  first  lived  as  a  lodger  in  the  old  house. 
It  was  here  he  heard  "  Footsteps  of  Angels" 
and  "  Voices  of  the  Night,"  and  saw  by  the 
fitful  firelight  the  "  Being  Beauteous"  at  his  side  ; 
here  he  wrote  "  Hyperion"  and  the  earlier 
poems  which  made  him  known  and  loved  in 
every  clime.  Later  this  room  became  the  nur- 
sery of  his  children,  and  some  of  the  grotesque 
ioS 


Where  Longfellow  Livtr 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


the  M  spreading  chestnut-tree"  of  the  smithy, 
which  was  presented  to  him  by  the  village  chil- 
dren and  celebrated  in  his  poem  "  From  my 
Arm-Chair."  About  us  here  are  his  cherished 
books,  his  pictures,  his  manuscripts,  all  his 
precious  belongings,  and  from  his  window  we 
Me,  beyond  the  Longfellow  Memorial  Park,  the 
river  so  often  sung  in  his  verse,  "  stealing  on- 
ward, like  the  stream  of  life."  In  this  room 
Washington  held  his  war  councils.  Of  the  many 
intellectual  seances  its  walls  have  witnessed  we 
contemplate  with  greatest  pleasure  the  Wednes- 
day evening  meetings  of  the  "  Dante  Club," 
when  Lowell,  Howells,  Fields,  Norton,  Greene, 
and  other  friends  and  scholars  sat  here  with 
Longfellow  to  revise  the  new  translation  of 
Dante. 

The  book-lined  apartment  over  the  study — 
once  the  bedchamber  of  Washington  and  later 
of  Talleyrand — was  occupied  by  Longfellow 
when  he  first  lived  as  a  lodger  in  the  old  house. 
Ir  was  here  he  heard  *  Footsteps  of  Angels" 
and  94  Voices  of  the  Night,"  and  saw  by  the 
fitful  firelight  the  '*  Being  Beauteous"  at  his  side  ; 
here  he  wrote  "  Hyperion"  and  the  earlier 
poems  which  made  him  known  and  loved  in 
every  clime.  Later  this  room  became  the  nur- 
sery of  his  children,  and  some  of  the  grotesque 


Cambridge 


tiles  which  adorn  its  chimney  are  mentioned  in 
his  poem  "  To  a  Child :" 

"  The  lady  with  the  gay  macaw, 
The  dancing-girl,  the  grave  bashaw, 
The  Chinese  mandarin." 

Along  the  western  facade  of  the  mansion  stretches 
a  wide  veranda,  where  the  poet  was  wont  to 
take  his  daily  exercise  when  "  the  goddess  Neu- 
ralgia" or  "  the  two  Ws"  (Work  and  Weather) 
prevented  his  walking  abroad.  In  this  stately 
old  house  his  children  were  born  and  reared, 
here  his  wife  met  her  tragic  death,  and  here  his 
daughter — the  "  grave  Alice"  of  "  The  Chil- 
dren's Hour" — abides  and  preserves  its  precious 
relics,  while  "  laughing  Allegra"  (Anna)  and 
"  Edith  with  golden  hair" — now  Mrs.  Dana 
and  Mrs.  Thorp — have  dwellings  within  the 
grounds  of  their  childhood  home,  and  their 
brother  Ernst  owns  a  modern  cottage  a  few  rods 
westward  on  the  same  street. 

In  Sparks  Street,  just  out  of  Brattle,  dwelt 
the  author  Robert  Carter, — familiarly,  "  The 
Don," — sometime  secretary  to  Prescott  and 
long  the  especial  friend  of  Lowell,  with  whom 
he  was  associated  in  the  editorship  of  the  short- 
lived "  Pioneer."  Carter's  home  here  was  the 
rendezvous  of  a  circle  of  choice  spirits,  where 
109 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


one  might  often  meet  "  Prince"  Lowell, — as  his 
friends  delighted  to  call  him, — Bartlett  of  "  Fa- 
miliar Quotations,"  and  that  "songless  poet" 
John  Holmes,  brother  of  the  "  American  Mon- 
taigne." 

A  short  walk  under  the  arching  elms  of  Brat- 
tle Street  brings  us  to  Elmwood,  the  life-long 
home  of  Lowell.  The  house,  erected  by  the 
last  British  lieutenant-governor  of  the  province, 
is  a  plain,  square  structure  of  wood,  three  stories 
in  height,  and  is  surrounded  by  a  park  of  simple 
and  natural  beauty,  whose  abundant  growth  of 
trees  gives  to  some  portions  of  the  grounds  the 
sombreness  and  apparent  seclusion  of  a  forest. 
A  gigantic  hedge  of  trees  encloses  the  place  like 
a  leafy  wall,  excluding  the  vision  of  the  world 
and  harboring  thousands  of  birds  who  tenant  its 
shades.  Some  of  the  aquatic  fowl  of  the  vici- 
nage are  referred  to  in  Longfellow's  "  Herons  of 
Elmwood."  In  the  old  mansion,  long  the  home 
of  Elbridge  Gerry,  Lowell  was  born  and  grew 
to  manhood,  and  to  it  he  brought  the  bride  of 
his  youth,  the  lovely  Maria  White,  herself  the 
writer  of  some  exquisite  poems ;  here,  a  few 
years  later,  she  died  in  the  same  night  that  a 
child  was  born  to  Longfellow,  whose  poem 
"  The  Two  Angels"  commemorates  both  events. 
Here,  too,  Lowell  lost  his  children  one  by  one 
no 


Elmwood 


until  a  daughter,  the  present  Mrs.  Burnett, — 
now  owner  and  occupant  of  Elmwood, — alone 
remained.  During  the  poet's  stay  abroad,  his 
house  was  tenanted  by  Mrs.  Ole  Bull  and  by 
LowelPs  brother-bard  Bailey  Aldrich,  who  in 
this  sweet  retirement  wrought  some  of  his  de- 
licious work.  To  the  beloved  trees  and  birds 
of  his  old  home  Lowell  returned  from  his  em- 
bassage, and  here,  with  his  daughter,  he  passed 
his  last  years  among  his  books  and  a  chosen  cir- 
cle of  friends.  Here,  where  he  wished  to  die,  he 
died,  and  here  his  daughter  preserves  his  former 
home  and  its  contents  unchanged  since  he  was 
borne  hence  to  his  burial.  Until  the  death  of 
his  father,  Lowell's  study  was  an  upper  front 
room  at  the  left  of  the  entrance.  It  is  a  plain, 
low-studded  corner  apartment,  which  the  poet 
called  "  his  garret,"  and  where  he  slept  as  a  boy. 
Its  windows  now  look  only  into  the  neighboring 
trees,  but  when  autumn  has  shorn  the  boughs  of 
their  foliage  the  front  window  commands  a  wide 
level  of  the  sluggish  Charles  and  its  bordering 
lowlands,  while  the  side  window  overlooks  the 
beautiful  slopes  of  Mount  Auburn,  where  Lowell 
now  lies  with  his  poet-wife  and  the  children 
who  went  before.  His  study  windows  suggested 
the  title  of  his  most  interesting  volume  of  prose 
essays.  In  this  upper  chamber  he  wrote  his 
in 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

"  Conversations  on  the  Poets"  and  the  early 
poems  which  made  his  fame, — "  Irene,"  "  Pro- 
metheus," "  Rhoecus,"  «  Sir  Launfal," — which 
was  composed  in  five  days, — and  the  first  series 
of  that  collection  of  grotesque  drolleries,  "  The 
Biglow  Papers."  Here  also  he  prepared  his 
editorial  contributions  to  the  "  Atlantic."  His 
later  study  was  on  the  lower  floor,  at  the  left  of 
the  ample  hall  which  traverses  the  centre  of  the 
house.  It  is  a  prim  and  delightful  old-fashioned 
apartment,  with  low  walls,  a  wide  and  cheerful 
fireplace,  and  pleasant  windows  which  look  out 
among  the  trees  and  lilacs  upon  a  long  reach  of 
lawn.  In  this  room  the  poet's  best-loved  books, 
copiously  annotated  by  his  hand,  remain  upon 
his  shelves ;  here  we  see  his  table,  his  accus- 
tomed chair,  the  desk  upon  which  he  wrote  the 
"  Commemoration  Ode,"  "  Under  the  Wil- 
lows," and  many  famous  poems,  besides  the 
volumes  of  prose  essays.  In  this  study  he 
sometimes  gathered  his  classes  in  Dante,  and  to 
him  here  came  his  friends  familiarly  and  in- 
formally,— for  u  receptions"  were  rare  at  Elm- 
wood  :  most  often  came  "  The  Don,"  "  The 
Doctor,"  Norton,  Owen,  Bartlett,  Felton,  Still- 
man, — less  frequently  Godkin,  Fields,  Holmes, 
Child,  Motley,  Edmund  Quincy,  and  the  his- 
torian Parkman. 

112 


Mount  Auburn 


While  the  older  trees  of  the  place  were  planted 
by  Gerry,  the  pines  and  clustering  lilacs  were 
rooted  by  Lowell  or  his  father.  All  who  re- 
member the  poet's  passionate  love  for  this  home 
will  rejoice  in  the  assurance  that  the  old  man- 
sion, with  its  precious  associations  and  memen- 
tos, and  the  acres  immediately  adjoining  it,  will 
not  be  in  any  way  disturbed  during  the  life 
of  his  daughter  and  her  children.  At  most, 
the  memorial  park  which  has  been  planned 
by  the  literary  people  of  Boston  and  Cambridge 
will  include  only  that  portion  of  the  grounds 
which  belonged  to  the  poet's  brothers  and 
sisters. 

A  narrow  street  separates  the  hedges  of  Elm- 
wood  from  the  peaceful  shades  of  Mount  Auburn, 
— the  "  City  of  the  Dead"  of  Longfellow's  son- 
net. Lowell  thought  this  the  most  delightful 
spot  on  earth.  The  late  Francis  Parkman  told 
the  writer  that  Lowell,  in  his  youth,  had  con- 
fided to  him  that  he  habitually  went  into  the 
cemetery  at  midnight  and  sat  upon  a  tombstone, 
hoping  to  find  there  the  poetic  afflatus.  He 
confessed  he  had  not  succeeded,  and  was  warned 
by  his  friend  that  the  custom  would  bring  him 
more  rheumatism  than  inspiration.  Dr.  Ellis 
testified  that  at  this  period  his  friend  Dr.  Lowell 
often  expressed  to  him  his  anxiety  "  lest  his  son 

H  II3 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


James  would  amount  to  nothing,  because  he  had 
taken  to  writing  poetry. " 

In  the  sanctuary  of  Mount  Auburn  we  find 
many  of  the  names  mentioned  in  these  chapters, 
— names  written  on  the  scroll  of  fame,  blazoned 
on  title-pages,  borne  in  the  hearts  of  thousands 
of  readers  in  all  lands, — now,  alas !  inscribed 
above  their  graves.  From  the  eminence  of  Mount 
Auburn,  we  look  upon  Longfellow's  river  "  steal- 
ing with  silent  pace"  around  the  sacred  en- 
closure ;  the  verdant  meads  along  the  stream ; 
the  distant  cities,  erst  the  abodes  of  those  who 
sleep  about  us  here, — for  whom  life's  fever  is 
ended  and  life's  work  done.  Near  this  summit, 
Charlotte  Cushman  rests  at  the  base  of  a  tall 
obelisk,  her  favorite  myrtle  growing  dense  and 
dark  above  her.  By  the  elevated  Ridge  Path, 
on  a  site  long  ago  selected  by  him,  Longfellow 
lies  in  a  grave  decked  with  profuse  flowers  and 
marked  by  a  monument  of  brown  stone.  On 
Fountain  Avenue  we  find  a  beautiful  spot,  shaded 
by  two  giant  trees,  which  was  a  beloved  resort 
of  Lowell,  and  where  he  now  lies  among  his  kin- 
dred, his  sepulchre  marked  by  a  simple  slab  of 
slate  :  "  Good-night,  sweet  Prince  !"  Not  far 
away  is  the  beautiful  Jackson  plot,  where  not 
long  ago  the  beloved  Holmes  was  tenderly  laid 
in  the  same  grave  with  his  wife  beneath  a  burden 
114 


Mount  Auburn 


of  flowers.  Some  of  the  blossoms  we  lately 
saw  upon  this  grave  were  newly  placed  by 
the  creator  of  "  Micah  Clarke"  and  "  Sherlock 
Holmes,"  Dr.  Conan  Doyle.  By  a  great  oak 
near  the  main  avenue  is  the  sarcophagus  of  Sum- 
ner, and  one  shady  slope  bears  the  memorial 
of  Margaret  Fuller  and  her  husband, — buried 
beneath  the  sea  on  the  coast  of  Fire  Island. 
Near  by  we  find  the  grave  of  "  Fanny  Fern," — 
wife  of  Parton  and  sister  of  N.  P.  Willis, — with 
its  white  cross  adorned  with  exquisitely  carved 
ferns;  the  pillar  of  granite  and  marble  which 
designates  the  resting-place  of  Everett;  the 
granite  boulder — its  unchiselled  surface  over- 
grown with  the  lichens  he  loved — which  covers 
the  ashes  of  Agassiz;  the  simple  sarcophagus 
of  Rufus  Choate ;  the  cenotaph  of  Kirkland ; 
the  tomb  of  Spurzheim;  and  on  the  lovely 
slopes  about  us,  under  the  dreaming  trees,  amid 
myriad  witcheries  of  bough  and  bloom,  are  the 
enduring  memorials  of  affection  beneath  which 
repose  the  mortal  parts  of  Sargent,  Quincy, 
Story,  Parker,  Worcester,  Greene,  Bigelow, 
William  Ellery  Channing,  Edwin  Booth,  Phil- 
lips Brooks,  and  many  like  them  whom  the 
world  will  not  soon  forget. 

In  this  sweet  summer  day,  their  place  of  rest 
is  so  quiet  and  beautiful, — with  the  birds  singing 
"5 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


here  their  lowest  and  tenderest  songs,  the  soft 
winds  breathing  a  lullaby  in  the  leafy  boughs, 
the  air  full  of  a  grateful  peace  and  calm,  the 
trees  spreading  their  great  branches  in  perpetual 
benediction  above  the  turf-grown  graves, — it 
seems  that  here,  if  anywhere,  the  restless  way- 
farer might  learn  to  love  restful  death. 


116 


OUT  OF  BOSTON 


II 

BELMONT:  THE  WAYSIDE 
INN :  HOME  OF  WHITTIER 


Lowell's  Beaver  Brook  —  Abode  of  Trowbridge  — Red  Horse 
Tavern  —  Parsons  and  the  Company  of  Longfellow's 
Friends  -  Birthplace  of  Whittier  -  Scenes  of  his  Poems  - 
Dwelling  and  Grave  of  the  Countess  —  Powow  Hill  — 
Whittier' s  Amesbury  Home-Hi s  Church  and  Tomb. 

A  FEW  miles  westward  from  the  classic  shades 
of  Cambridge  we  found,  perched  upon  a 
breezy  height  of  Belmont,  a  picturesque,  red- 
roofed  villa,  for  some  years  the  summer  home  of 
our  "  Altrurian  Traveller."  From  its  verandas 
he  overlooked  a  slumberous  plain,  diversified 
with  meads,  fields,  country-seats,  and  heavy- 
tinted  copses,  and  bordered  by  a  circle  of  ver- 
dant hills;  while  on  the  eastern  horizon  rises 
the  distant  city,  crowned  by  the  resplendent 
dome  of  the  capitol.  In  his  dainty  white  study 
here,  with  its  gladsome  fireplace  and  curious 
carvings  and  mottoes,  Howells  wrote — besides 
other  good  things — his  "  Lady  of  the  Aroos- 
took," in  which  some  claim  to  have  discerned 
an  answer  to  Henry  James's  "  Daisy  Miller." 
117 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


In  this  neighborhood  is  the  valley  of  "  Beaver 
Brook,"  a  favorite  haunt  of  Lowell,  to  which 
he  brought  the  English  poet  Arthur  Clough. 
The  old  mill  is  removed,  but  we  find  the  water- 
fall and  the  other  romantic  features  little  changed 
since  the  poet  depicted  the  ideal  beauties  of 
this  dale,  in  what  has  been  adjudged  one  of  the 
most  artistic  poems  of  modern  times. 

In  a  charming  retreat  among  the  hills  of 
Arlington,  scarce  a  mile  away  from  Howells's 
sometime  Belmont  home,  dwells  and  writes 
that  genial  and  gifted  poet  and  novelist,  John 
T.  Trowbridge,  whose  books  —  notably  his 
war-time  tales — have  found  readers  round  the 
world. 

Westward  again  from  Belmont,  a  prolonged 
drive  through  a  delightful  country  brings  us  to 
"Sudbury  town"  and  the  former  hostelry  of 
'Squire  Howe, — the  "  Wayside  Inn"  of  Long- 
fellow's "  Tales."  Our  companion  and  guide 
is  one  who  well  knew  the  old  house  and  its 
neighborhood  in  the  halcyon  days  when  Pro- 
fessor Treadwell,  Parsons, — the  poet  of  the 
"  Bust  of  Dante," — and  the  quiet  coterie  of 
Longfellow's  friends  came,  summer  after  sum- 
mer, to  find  rest  and  seclusion  under  its  ample 
roof  and  sheltering  trees,  among  the  hills  of 
this  remote  region.  The  environment  of  fra- 
118 


Longfellow's  Wayside  Inn 


grant  meadow  and  smiling  field,  of  deep  wood 
glade  and  forest-clad  height,  is  indeed  alluring. 
About  the  ancient  inn  remain  some  of  the  giant 
elms  and  the  "oak-trees,  broad  and  high," 
shading  it  now  as  in  the  day  when  the  "  Tales" 
immortalized  it  with  the  "  Tabard"  of  Chaucer; 
while  through  the  near  meadow  circles  the 
«« well-remembered  brook"  of  the  poet's  verse, 
in  which  his  friends  saw  the  inverted  landscape 
and  their  own  faces  "  looking  up  at  them  from 
below." 

The  house  is  a  great,  old-fashioned,  bare 
and  weather-worn  edifice  of  wood, — "  somewhat 
fallen  to  decay." — standing  close  upon  the  high- 
way. Its  two  stories  of  spacious  rooms  are 
supplemented  by  smaller  chambers  in  a  vast 
attic ;  two  or  three  chimneys,  "  huge  and  tiled 
and  tall,"  rise  through  its  gambrel  roofs  among 
the  bowering  foliage ;  a  wing  abuts  upon  one 
side  and  imparts  a  pleasing  irregularity  to  the 
otherwise  plain  parallelogram.  The  wide,  low- 
studded  rooms  are  lighted  by  windows  of  many 
small  panes.  Among  the  apartments  we  find 
the  one  once  occupied  by  Major  Molineaux, 
"  whom  Hawthorne  hath  immortal  made,"  and 
that  of  Dr.  Parsons,  the  laureate  of  this  place, 
who  has  celebrated  it  in  the  stanzas  of  "  Old 
House  at  Sudbury"  and  other  poems.  But  it 
119 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


is  the  old  inn  parlor  which  most  interests  the 
literary  visitor, — a  great,  low,  square  apartment, 
with  oaken  floors,  ponderous  beams  overhead, 
and  a  broad  hearth,  where  in  the  olden  time 
blazed  a  log  fire  whose  ruddy  glow  filled  the 
room  and  shone  out  through  the  windows.  It 
is  this  room  which  Longfellow  peoples  with  his 
friends,  who  sat  about  the  old  fireplace  and  told 
his  "Tales  of  a  Wayside  Inn."  The  "rapt 
musician"  whose  transfiguring  portraiture  we 
have  in  the  Prelude  is  Ole  Bull;  the  student 
"  of  old  books  and  days"  is  Henry  Wales ;  the 
young  Sicilian,  "  in  sight  of  Etna  born  and 
bred,"  is  Luigi  Monti,  who  dined  every  Sunday 
with  Longfellow  ;  the  "  Spanish  Jew  from  Ali- 
cant"  is  Edrelei,  a  Boston  Oriental  dealer ;  the 
"  Theologian  from  the  school  of  Cambridge  on 
the  Charles"  is  Professor  Daniel  Treadwell ; 
the  Poet  is  T.  W.  Parsons,  the  Dantean  student 
and  translator  of  "  Divina  Commedia ;"  the 
Landlord  is  'Squire  Lyman  Howe,  the  portly 
bachelor  who  then  kept  this  "  Red  Horse  Tav- 
ern," as  it  was  called.  Most  of  this  goodly 
circle  have  been  here  in  the  flesh,  and  our  com- 
panion has  seen  them  in  this  old  room,  as  well 
as  Longfellow  himself,  who  came  here  years 
afterward,  when  the  Landlord  was  dead  and  the 
poet's  company  had  left  the  old  inn  forever. 
1 20 


Longfellow's  Wayside  Inn 


In  this  room  we  see  the  corner  where  stood  the 
ancient  spinet,  the  spot  on  the  wall  where  hung 
the  highly  colored  coat  of  arms  of  Howe  and 
the  sword  of  his  knightly  grandfather  near 
Queen  Mary's  pictured  face,  the  places  on  the 
prismatic-hued  windows  where  the  names  of 
Molineaux,  Treadwell,  etc.,  had  been  inscribed 
by  hands  that  now  are  dust. 

Descendants  of  the  woman  who  died  of  the 
*«  Shoe  o*  Num  Palsy"  are  said  to  live  in  the 
neighborhood,  as  well  as  some  other  odd  char- 
acters who  are  embalmed  in  Parsons's  humorous 
verse.  But  the  ancient  edifice  is  no  longer  an 
inn ;  the  Red  Horse  on  the  swinging  sign-board 
years  ago  ceased  to  invite  the  weary  wayfarer  to 
rest  and  cakes  and  ale ;  the  memory-haunted 
chambers,  where  starry  spirits  met  and  tarried  in 
the  golden  past,  were  later  inhabited  by  laborers, 
who  displayed  the  rooms  for  a  fee  and  plied  the 
pilgrim  with  lies  anent  the  former  famed  occu- 
pants. The  storied  structure  has  recently  passed 
to  the  possession  of  appreciative  owners, — Hon. 
Herbert  Howe  being  one  of  them, — who  have 
made  the  repairs  needful  for  its  preservation  and 
have  placed  it  in  the  charge  of  a  proper  custo- 
dian. 

A  longer  way  out  of  Boston,  in  another  direc- 
tion, our  guest  is  among  the  haunts  of  the  be- 

121 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

loved  Quaker  bard.  On  the  bank  of  the  Merri- 
mac — his  own  "  lowland  river" — and  among 
darkly  wooded  hills  of  hackmatack  and  pine, 
we  find  the  humble  farm-house,  guarded  by  giant 
sentinel  poplars,  where  eighty-eight  years  agone 
Whittier  came  into  the  world. 

Among  the  plain  and  bare  apartments,  with 
their  low  ceilings,  antique  cross-beams,  and 
multipaned  windows,  we  see  the  lowly  chamber 
of  his  birth ;  the  simple  study  where  his  literary 
work  was  begun;  the  great  kitchen,  with  its 
brick  oven  and  its  heavy  crane  in  the  wide  fire- 
place, where  he  laid  the  famous  winters  evening 
scene  in  "  Snow-Bound,"  peopling  the  plain 
"  old  rude-furnished  room"  with  the  persons  he 
here  best  knew  and  loved.  We  see  the  dwell- 
ing little  changed  since  the  time  when  Whittier 
dwelt — a  dark-haired  lad — under  its  roof ;  it  is 
now  carefully  preserved,  and  through  the  old 
rooms  are  disposed  articles  of  furniture  from  his 
Amesbury  cottage,  which  are  objects  of  interest 
to  many  visitors. 

All  about  the  place  are  spots  of  tender  identi- 
fication of  poet  and  poem :  here  are  the  brook 
and  the  garden  wall  of  his  "  Barefoot  Boy ;"  the 
scene  of  his  "  Telling  the  Bees ;"  the  spring  and 
meadow  of  "  Maud  Muller ;"  not  far  away, 
with  the  sumachs  and  blackberries  clustering  about 
12a 


Scenes  of  Whittier's  Poems 


it  still,  is  the  site  of  the  rude  academy  of  his 
"  School  Days and  beyond  the  low  hill  the 
grasses  grow  upon  the  grave  of  the  dear,  brown- 
eyed  girl  who  "  hated  to  go  above  him."  We 
may  still  loiter  beneath  the  overarching  syca- 
mores planted  by  poor  Tallant, — "  pioneer  of 
Erin's  outcasts," — where  young  Whittier  pon- 
dered the  story  of  "  Floyd  Ireson  with  the  hard 
heart." 

Delightful  rambles  through  the  country-side 
bring  us  to  many  scenes  familiar  to  the  tender 
poet  and  by  him  made  familiar  to  all  the  world. 
Thus  we  come  to  the  "  stranded  village"  of 
Aunt  Mose, — "  the  muttering  witch-wife  of  the 
gossip's  tale," — where  Whittier  found  the  ma- 
terials out  of  which  he  wrought  the  touching 
poem  "  The  Countess,"  and  where  we  see  the 
poor  low  rooms  in  which  pretty,  blue-eyed 
Mary  Ingalls  was  born  and  lived  a  too  brief 
life  of  love,  and  her  sepulchre — now  reclaimed 
from  a  tangle  of  brake  and  brier — in  the  lonely 
old  burial-ground  that  "slopes  against  the 
west."  Her  grave  is  in  the  row  nearest  the 
dusty  highway,  and  is  marked  by  a  mossy 
slab  of  slate,  which  is  now  protected  from 
the  avidity  of  relic-gatherers  by  a  net-work  of 
iron,  bearing  the  inscription,  "  The  Grave  of 
the  Countess." 

1*3 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


Thus,  too,  we  come  to  the  ruined  foundation 
of  the  cottage  of  "  Mabel  Martin,  the  Witch's 
Daughter,"  and  look  thence  upon  other  haunts 
of  the  beloved  bard,  as  well  as  upon  his  river 
"  glassing  the  heavens"  and  the  wave-like  swells 
of  foliage-clad  hills  which  are  "  The  Laurels" 
of  his  verse.  In  West  Newbury,  the  town  of 
his  "  Northman's  Written  Rock,"  we  find  the 
comfortable  "  Maplewood"  homestead  where 
lived  and  lately  died  the  supposed  sweetheart  of 
the  poet's  early  manhood. 

Whittier's  beloved  Amesbury,  the  "  home  of 
his  heart,"  is  larger  and  busier  than  he  knew  it, 
but,  as  we  dally  on  its  dusty  avenues,  we  find 
them  aglow  with  living  memories  of  the  sweet 
singer.  In  Friend  Street  stands — still  occupied 
by  Whittier's  former  friends — the  plain  little 
frame  house  which  was  so  long  his  home.  A 
bay  window  has  been  placed  above  the  porch, 
but  the  place  is  otherwise  little  changed  since 
he  left  it ;  the  same  noble  elms  shade  the  front, 
the  fruit-trees  he  planted  and  pruned  and  be- 
neath which  the  saddened  throng  sat  at  his 
funeral  are  in  the  garden ;  here  too  are  the 
grape-vines  which  were  the  especial  objects  of 
his  loving  care, — one  of  them  grown  from  a 
rootlet  sent  to  him  in  a  letter  by  Charles 
Sumner. 

124 


Whittier's  Amesbury  Cottage 


Within,  we  see  the  famous  "  garden  room," 
which  was  his  sanctum  and  workshop,  and 
where  this  gentle  man  of  peace  waged  valiant 
warfare  with  his  pen  for  the  rights  of  man. 
In  this  room,  with  its  sunny  outlook  among 
his  vines  and  pear-trees,  he  kept  his  chosen 
books,  his  treasured  souvenirs ;  and  here  he 
welcomed  his  friends, —  Longfellow,  Fields, 
Sumner,  Lowell,  Colonel  Higginson,  Bayard 
Taylor,  Mrs.  Thaxter,  Mrs.  Phelps- Ward, 
Alice  Cary,  Lucy  Larcom,  Sarah  Orne  Jew- 
ett,  and  many  another  illustrious  child  of 
genius. 

A  quaint  Franklin  fireplace  stood  by  one  side 
wall, — usually  surmounted  in  summer  by  a 
bouquet ;  in  the  nook  between  this  and  the 
sash-door  was  placed  an  old-fashioned  writing- 
desk,  and  here  he  wrote  many  of  the  poems 
which  brought  him  world-wide  fame  and  voiced 
the  convictions  and  the  conscience  of  half  the 
nation.  Here  are  still  preserved  some  of  his 
cherished  books.  Above  the  study  was  Whit- 
tier's  bedchamber,  near  the  rooms  of  his  mother, 
his  "  youngest  and  dearest"  sister,  and  the  "  dear 
aunt"  (Mercy)  of  "  Snow-Bound,"  who  came 
with  him  to  this  home  and  shared  it  until  their 
deaths.  After  the  others  were  gone,  the  brother 
and  sister  long  dwelt  here  alone,  later  a  niece 
"5 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


was  for  some  years  his  house-keeper,  and  at  her 
marriage  the  poet  gave  up  most  of  the  house  to 
some  old  friends,  who  kept  his  study  and  cham- 
ber in  constant  readiness  for  his  return  upon  the 
prolonged  sojourns  which  were  continued  until 
his  last  year  of  life, — this  being  always  his  best- 
loved  home.  * 

Near  by  are  the  "  painted  shingly  town-house" 
of  his  verse,  where  during  many  years  he  failed 
not  to  meet  with  his  neighbors  to  deposit  **  the 
freeman's  vote  for  Freedom,"  and  the  little, 
wooden  Friends'  meeting-house,  where  he  loved 
to  sit  in  silent  introspection  among  the  people 
of  his  faith.  The  trees  which  now  shade  its 
plain  old  walls  with  abundant  foliage  were  long 
ago  planted  by  his  hands.  The  "  Powow  Hill" 
of  his  "  Preacher"  and  "  The  Prophecy  of 
Samuel  Sewall"  rises  steeply  near  his  home,  and 
was  a  favorite  resort,  to  which  he  often  came, 
alone  or  with  his  guests.  One  who  has  often 
stood  with  Whittier  there  pilots  us  to  his  ac- 
customed place  on  the  lofty  rounded  summit, 
whence  we  overlook  the  village,  the  long  reach 
of  the  "sea-seeking"  river,  and  the  entrancing 
scene  pictured  by  the  poet  in  the  beautiful  lines 
of  "  Miriam." 

From  these  precious  haunts  our  pilgrim  shoon 
trace  the  revered  bard  to  the  peaceful  precincts 
126 


Whittier's  Tomb 

of  the  God's-acre — just  without  the  town — 
where,  in  a  sequestered  spot  beneath  a  dark  cedar 
which  sobs  and  soughs  in  the  summer  wind,  his 
mortal  part  is  forever  laid,  with  his  beloved 
sister  and  kindred,  within 

"  the  low  green  tent 
Whose  curtain  never  outward  swings." 


1*7 


OUT  OF  BOSTON 


III 

SALEM:  WHITTIER'S  OAK- 
KNOLL  AND  BEYOND 


Cemetery  of  Hawthorne*  s  Ancestors- Birthplace  of  Hawthorne 
and  his  Wife-Where  Fame  was  won— House  of  the  Seven 
Gables-Custom- House- Where  Scarlet  Letter  was  written 
-Main  Street  and  Witch  Hill  -  Sights  from  a  Steeple- 
Later  Home  of  Whittier-Norman' s  Woe-Lucy  Larcom- 
Partont  etc. -Ri-ver  mouth-  Thaxter. 

A  HALF-HOUR'S  jaunt  by  train  brings  us 
to  the  shaded  streets  of  quaint  old  Salem 
and  the  scenes  of  Hawthorne's  early  life,  work, 
and  triumph.  Here  we  find  on  Charter  Street, 
in  the  old  cemetery  of  "  Dr.  Grimshaw's  Secret" 
and  "  Dolliver  Romance,"  the  sunken  and  turf- 
grown  graves  of  Hawthorne's  mariner  ancestors, 
some  of  whom  sailed  forth  on  the  ocean  of 
eternity  nearly  two  centuries  ago.  Among  the 
curiously  carved  gravestones  of  slate  we  see  that 
of  John  Hathorn,  the  "witch-judge"  of  Haw- 
thorne's "  Note-Books."  Close  at  hand  repose 
the  ancestors  of  the  novelist's  wife,  and  the 
Doctor  Swinnerton  who  preceded  "  Dolliver" 
and  who  was  called  to  consider  the  cause  of 
128 


Hawthorne's  Salem 


Colonel  Pyncheon's  death  in  the  opening  chap- 
ter of  "  The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables." 

The  sombre  house  which  encroaches  upon  a 
corner  of  the  cemetery  enclosure — with  the 
green  billows  surging  about  it  so  closely  that  its 
side  windows  are  within  our  reach  from  the 
gravestones — was  the  home  of  the  Peabodys, 
whence  Hawthorne  wooed  the  amiable  Sophia, 
and  where,  in  his  tales,  he  domiciled  Grandsir 
"  Dolliver"  and  also  M  Doctor  Grimshaw"  with 
Ned  and  Elsie.  We  found  it  a  rather  depressing, 
hip-roofed,  low-studded,  and  irregular  edifice  of 
wood,  standing  close  upon  the  street,  and  ob- 
viously degenerated  a  little  from  the  degree  of 
respectability — "not  sinking  below  the  boundary 
of  the  genteel" — which  the  romancer  ascribed 
to  it.  The  little  porch  or  hood  protects  the 
front  entrance,  and  the  back  door  communicates 
with  the  cemetery, — a  circumstance  which  re- 
calls the  novelist's  fancy  that  the  dead  might  get 
out  of  their  graves  at  night  and  steal  into  this 
house  to  warm  themselves  at  the  convenient 
fireside. 

Not  many  rods  distant,  in  Union  Street,  stands 
the  little  house  where  Captain  Hathorn  left  his 
family  when  he  went  away  to  sea,  and  where  the 
novelist  was  born.  The  street  is  small,  shabby, 
shadeless,  dispiriting, — its  inhabitants  not  select, 
i  129 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

The  house — builded  by  Hawthorne's  grand- 
father and  lately  numbered  twenty-seven  — 
stands  close  to  the  sidewalk,  upon  which  its 
door-stone  encroaches,  leaving  no  space  for  flower 
or  vine  ;  the  garden  where  Hawthorne  "  rolled 
on  a  grass-plot  under  an  apple-tree  and  picked 
abundant  currants"  is  despoiled  of  turf  and  tree, 
and  the  wooden  house  walls  rise  bare  and  bleak. 
It  is  a  plain,  uninviting,  eight-roomed  structure, 
with  a  lower  addition  at  the  back,  and  with  a 
square  central  chimney-stack  rising  like  a  tower 
above  the  gambrel  roof.  The  rooms  are  low 
and  contracted,  with  quaint  corner  fireplaces 
and  curiously  designed  closets,  and  with  pro- 
tuberant beams  crossing  the  ceilings.  From  the 
entrance  between  the  front  rooms  a  narrow 
winding  stair  leads  to  an  upper  landing,  at  the 
left  of  which  we  find  the  little,  low-ceiled  cham- 
ber where,  ninety  years  ago,  America's  greatest 
romancer  first  saw  the  light.  It  is  one  of  the 
most  cheerless  of  rooms,  with  rude  fireplace  of 
bricks,  a  mantel  of  painted  planks,  and  two 
small  windows  which  look  into  the  verdureless 
yard.  In  a  modest  brick  house  upon  the  oppo- 
site side  of  the  street,  and  but  a  few  rods  distant 
from  the  birthplace  of  her  future  husband,  Haw- 
thorne's wife  was  born  five  years  subsequent  to 
his  nativity. 

130 


The  Manning  House 

Abutting  upon  the  back  yard  of  Hawthorne's 
birthplace  is  the  old  Manning  homestead  of  his 
maternal  ancestors,  the  home  of  his  own  youth 
and  middle  age  and  the  theatre  of  his  struggles 
and  triumph.  It  is  known  as  number  twelve 
Herbert  Street,  and  is  a  tall,  unsightly,  erratic 
fabric  of  wood,  with  nothing  pleasing  or  gracious 
in  its  aspect  or  environment.  The  ugly  and 
commonplace  character  of  his  surroundings  here 
during  half  his  life  must  have  been  peculiarly 
depressing  to  such  a  sensitive  temperament  as 
Hawthorne's,  and  doubtless  accounts  for  his  men- 
tal habits.  That  he  had  no  joyous  memories  of 
this  old  house  his  letters  and  journals  abundantly 
show.  Its  interior  arrangement  has  been  some- 
what changed  to  accommodate  the  several  fam- 
ilies of  laborers  who  have  since  inhabited  it, 
and  one  front  room  seems  to  have  been  used  as 
a  shop  ;  but  it  is  not  difficult  to  identify  the 
haunted  chamber  which  was  Hawthorne's  bed- 
room and  study.  This  little,  dark,  dreary 
apartment  under  the  eaves,  with  its  multipaned 
window  looking  down  into  the  room  where  he 
was  born,  is  to  us  one  of  the  most  interesting  of 
all  the  Hawthorne  shrines.  Here  the  magician 
kept  his  solitary  vigil  during  the  long  period  of 
his  literary  probation,  shunning  his  family,  de- 
clining all  human  sympathy  and  fellowship,  for 
131 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

some  time  going  abroad  only  after  nightfall ; 
here  he  studied,  pondered,  wrote,  revised,  de- 
stroyed, day  after  day  as  the  slow  months  went 
by ;  and  here,  after  ten  years  of  working  and 
waiting  for  the  world  to  know  him,  he  tri- 
umphantly recorded,  "  In  this  dismal  chamber 
FAME  was  won."  Here  he  wrote  •*  Twice- 
Told  Tales"  and  many  others,  which  were  pub- 
lished in  various  periodicals,  and  here,  after  his 
residence  at  the  old  Manse, — for  it  was  to  this 
Manning  house  that  he  "always  came  back,  like 
the  bad  halfpenny,"  as  he  said, — he  completed 
the  "  Mosses."  This  old  dwelling  is  one  of 
the  several  which  have  been  fixed  upon  as 
being  the  original  "  House  of  the  Seven  Gables," 
despite  the  novelist's  averment  that  the  Pyncheon 
mansion  was  "  of  materials  long  in  use  for  con- 
structing castles  in  the  air."  The  pilgrim  in 
Salem  will  be  persistently  assured  that  a  house 
which  stands  near  the  shore  by  the  foot  of 
Turner  Street,  and  is  known  as  number  thirty- 
four,  was  the  model  of  Hawthorne's  structure. 
It  is  an  antique  edifice  of  some  architectural 
pretensions,  displays  five  fine  gables,  and  has 
spacious  wainscoted  and  frescoed  apartments, 
with  quaint  mantels  and  other  evidences  of  co- 
lonial stateliness.  It  was  an  object  familiar  to  the 
novelist  from  his  boyhood, — he  had  often  visited 
13a 


Hawthorne's  Custom-House 


it  while  it  was  the  home  of  pretty  "  Susie" 
Ingersol, — and  it  may  have  suggested  the  style 
of  architecture  he  employed  for  the  visionary 
mansion  of  the  tale.  The  names  Maule  and 
Pyncheon,  employed  in  the  story,  were  those 
of  old  residents  of  Salem. 

But  a  few  rods  from  Herbert  Street  is  the 
Custom-House  where  Hawthorne  did  irksome 
duty  as  "  Locofoco  Surveyor,"  its  exterior  being 
— except  for  the  addition  of  a  cupola — essen- 
tially unchanged  since  his  description  was  writ- 
ten, and  its  interior  being  even  more  somnolent 
than  of  yore.  The  wide  and  worn  granite  steps 
still  lead  up  to  the  entrance  portico ;  above  it 
hovers  the  same  enormous  specimen  of  the 
American  eagle,  and  a  recent  reburnishing  has 
rendered  even  more  evident  the  truculent  atti- 
tude of  that  "  unhappy  fowl."  The  entry-way 
where  the  venerable  officials  of  Hawthorne's 
time  sat  at  the  receipt  of  customs  has  been 
renovated,  the  antique  chairs  in  which  they 
used  to  drowse,  "  tilted  back  against  the  wall," 
have  given  place  to  others  of  more  modern  and 
elegant  fashion,  and  the  patriarchal  dozers  them- 
selves— lying  now  in  the  profounder  slumber 
of  death — are  replaced  by  younger  and  sprightlier 
successors,  who  wear  their  dignities  and  pocket 
their  emoluments.  At  the  left  we  find  the 
*33 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

room,  "  fifteen  feet  square  and  of  lofty  height," 
which  was  Hawthorne's  office  during  the  period 
of  his  surveyorship :  it  is  no  longer  '*  cob- 
webbed  and  dingy,"  but  is  tastefully  refitted  and 
refurnished,  and  the  once  sanded  floor,  which 
the  romancer  "paced  from  corner  to  corner" 
like  a  caged  lion,  is  now  neatly  carpeted.  The 
"exceedingly  decrepit  and  infirm"  chairs,  and 
the  three-legged  stool  on  which  he  lounged  with 
his  elbow  on  the  old  pine  desk,  have  been  re- 
tired, and  the  desk  itself  is  now  tenderly  cher- 
ished among  the  treasures  of  the  Essex  Institute, 
on  Essex  Street,  a  few  blocks  distant,  where  the 
custodian  proudly  shows  us  the  name  of  Haw- 
thorne graven  within  the  lid,  in  some  idle 
moment,  by  the  thumb-nail  of  the  novelist. 
Some  yellow  documents  bearing  his  official 
stamp  and  signature  are  preserved  at  the  Custom- 
House,  and  the  courteous  official  who  now  occu- 
pies Hawthorne's  room  displays  to  us  here  a 
rough  stencil  plate  marked  "  Salem  N  Haw- 
thorne Surr  1847,"  by  means  of  which  knowl- 
edge of  Hawthorne's  existence  was  blazoned 
abroad  "  on  pepper-bags,  cigar-boxes,  and  bales 
of  dutiable  merchandise,"  instead  of  on  title- 
pages.  The  arched  window,  by  which  stood 
his  desk,  commands  a  view  upon  which  his 
vision  often  rested,  and  which  seems  to  us  de- 
i34 


Hawthorne's  Custom-House 


cidedly  more  pleasing  and  attractive  than  he  has 
led  us  to  expect.  The  picturesque  old  wharf 
in  the  foreground,  the  white-sailed  shipping, 
and  a  shimmering  expanse  of  water  extending 
to  the  farther  bold  headlands  of  the  coast  form, 
we  think,  a  pleasant  picture  for  the  lounger 
here. 

The  apartment  opposite  to  Hawthorne's  was, 
in  his  day,  occupied  by  the  brave  warrior  Gen- 
eral James  Miller,  who  is  graphically  described 
as  the  "  old  Collector"  in  the  introduction  to 
u  Scarlet  Letter ;"  in  the  room  directly  above  it 
— which  is  the  private  office  of  the  present 
chief  executive,  the  genial  Collector  Waters — 
a  portrait  of  the  hero  of  Lundy's  Lane  now 
looks  down  from  the  wall  upon  the  visitor ;  but 
no  picture  of  Hawthorne  is  to  be  found  in  the 
edifice. 

An  ample  room  at  the  right  of  the  hall  on 
the  second  floor,  now  handsomely  fitted  and 
furnished,  was  in  Hawthorne's  time  open  and 
unfinished,  its  bare  beams  festooned  with  cob- 
webs and  its  floor  lumbered  with  barrels  and 
bundles  of  musty  official  documents;  and  it 
was  here  that  he  discovered,  among  the  accumu- 
lated rubbish  of  the  past,  the  '*  scarlet,  gold- 
embroidered  letter,"  and  the  manuscript  of  Sur- 
veyor Prue, — Hawthorne's  ancient  predecessor 
'35 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


in  office, — which  recorded  the  n  doings  and 
sufferings"  of  Hester  Prynne. 

A  short  walk  from  the  Custom-House  brings 
us  to  the  spot  where,  with  '*  public  notices 
posted  upon  its  front  and  an  iron  goblet  chained 
to  its  waist,"  stood  that  M  eloquent  monolo- 
gist,"  the  town-pump  of  Hawthorne's  famous 
"  Rill."  Already  its  locality,  at  the  corner  of 
Essex  and  Washington  Streets,  is  pointed  out 
with  pride  as  being  among  the  sites  memora- 
ble in  the  town's  history,  and  thus  the  playful 
prophecy  with  which  Hawthorne  terminates 
the  sketch  of  his  official  life  is  more  than  ful- 
filled. 

The  spacious  and  well-preserved  old  frame 
house  at  number  fourteen  Mall  Street — a  neigh- 
borhood superior  to  that  of  his  former  residences 
— was  Hawthorne's  abode  for  three  or  four 
years.  It  was  here  that  he,  on  the  day  of  his 
official  death,  announced  to  his  wife,  "  Well, 
Sophie,  my  head  is  off,  so  I  must  write  a  book  ;" 
and  here,  in  the  ensuing  six  months,  disturbed 
and  distressed  by  illness  of  his  family,  by  the 
death  of  his  mother,  and  by  financial  needs,  he 
wrote  our  most  famous  romance,  "  The  Scarlet 
Letter."  A  bare  little  room  in  the  front  of  the 
third  story  was  his  study  here,  and  while  he 
wrote  in  solitude  his  wife  worked  in  a  sitting- 
136 


Salem— Witch  Hill 


room  just  beneath,  decorating  lamp-shades  whose 
sale  helped  to  sustain  the  household. 

As  we  saunter  along  the  "  Main  Street"  of 
Hawthorne's  sketch  and  the  other  shady  avenues 
he  knew  so  well,  the  curious  old  town,  which 
in  his  discontent  he  called  tame  and  unattractive, 
seems  to  our  eyes  picturesque  and  beautiful,  with 
its  wide  elm-bordered  streets,  its  grassy  way- 
sides, its  many  gardens  and  square,  embowered 
dwellings,  not  greatly  changed  since  he  knew 
them.  If  we  follow  "  the  long  and  lazy  street" 
to  the  Witch  Hill,  which  the  novelist  describes 
in  "Alice  Doane's  Appeal,"  we  may  behold 
from  that  unhappy  spot,  where  men  and  women 
suffered  death  for  imagined  misdoing,  the  whole 
of  Hawthorne's  Salem,  with  the  environment 
he  pictures  in  "  Sights  from  a  Steeple."  We 
see  the  house-roofs  of  the  town — half  hidden 
by  clustering  foliage — extending  now  from  the 
slopes  of  the  fateful  hill  to  the  glinting  waters 
of  the  harbor ;  the  farther  expanse  of  field  and 
meadow,  dotted  with  white  villages  and  scored 
with  shadowy  water-ways ;  the  craggy  coast, 
with  the  Atlantic  thundering  endlessly  against 
its  headlands.  Yonder  is  the  steeple  of  Haw- 
thorne's vision,  beyond  is  the  scene  of  the  ex- 
quisite "  Footprints  in  the  Sand,"  and  across 
the  blue  of  the  rippling  sea  we  behold  the  place 
137 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


of  the  fierce  fight  in  which  the  gallant  Lawrence 
lost  at  once  his  ship  and  his  life. 

Not  far  from  Salem  is  Oak-Knoll,  where  the 
white-souled  Whittier,  "  wearing  his  silver 
crown,"  passed  "  life's  late  afternoon"  with  his 
devoted  relatives.  It  is  a  delightful,  sheltered 
old  country-seat,  with  wide  lawns,  and  scores 
of  broad  acres  wooded  with  noble  trees,  beneath 
which  the  poet  loved  to  stroll  or  sit,  soothed 
and  inspirited  by  the  gracious  and  generous 
beauty  of  the  scene  about  him. 

One  spot  in  the  glimmering  shade  of  an  over- 
arching oak  is  shown  as  his  favorite  resort. 
Close  by  the  house  is  a  circular,  green-walled 
garden,  where,  in  summer  mornings,  he  delighted 
to  work  with  rake  and  hoe  among  the  flowers. 
The  mansion  is  a  dreamful,  old-fashioned  edifice, 
with  wide  and  lofty  piazzas,  whose  roofs  are 
upheld  by  massive  columns ;  and,  with  its  grand 
setting  of  trees,  it  presents  a  pleasing  picture. 
Whittier's  study — a  pleasant,  cheerful  room, 
with  a  delightful  outlook  and  sunny  exposure,  a 
friendly-looking  fireplace,  and  a  glass  door  open- 
ing upon  the  veranda — was  especially  erected 
for  him  in  a  corner  of  the  house,  and  here  his 
later  poems  were  penned.  A  bright  and  ample 
chamber  above  the  parlor  was  his  sleeping-apart- 
ment. 

138 


Whittier — Longfellow,  etc. 


The  sweet  poetess  Miss  Preston  and  the 
sprightly  and  versatile  "  Gail  Hamilton"  dwelt 
in  the  neighborhood  and  came  often  to  this 
room  to  talk  with  the  "  transplanted  prophet  of 
Amesbury."  Lucy  Larcom  and  that  "  Sappho 
of  the  isles,"  Celia  Thaxter,  came  less  fre- 
quently. The  place  is  still  occupied  by  the 
relatives  Whittier  loved,  who  have  preserved 
essentially  unchanged  the  scenes  he  here  in- 
habited. 

A  little  farther  up  the  rock-bound  coast  are  the 
scene  of  Lucy  Larcom's  touching  poem  "  Han- 
nah's at  the  Window  Binding  Shoes the 
hearth-stone  where  Longfellow  saw  his  "  Fire  of 
Drift-Wood and  the  bleak  sea-side  home  of 
"  Floyd  Ireson"  of  Whittier's  verse.  Beyond 
these  lie  the  sometime  summer  homes  of  the 
poet  Dana,  Harriet  Prescott  SpofFord,  Fields, 
and  Whipple,  with  that  Mecca  of  the  tourist, 
the  savage  reef  of  Norman's  Woe, — celebrated 
in  Longfellow's  pathetic  poem  as  the  scene  of 
"  The  Wreck  of  the  Hesperus," — not  far  away  ; 
while  across  the  harbor  a  summer  resort  of  the 
gifted  Elizabeth  Stuart  Phelps  Ward  stands — 
an  "  Old  Maid's  Paradise"  no  longer — among 
the  rocks  of  the  shore. 

By  the  mouth  of  Whittier's  u  lowland  river" 
we  find  the  birthplace  of  Lloyd  Garrison,  the 
139 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


ancestral  abode  of  the  Longfellows,  the  tomb  of 
Whitefield  beneath  the  spot  where  he  preached, 
the  once  sojourn  of  Talleyrand.  Here,  too, 
still  inhabited  by  his  family,  we  find  the  large, 
three-storied  corner  house  in  which  Parton  spent 
his  last  twenty  years  of  busy  life,  and  the  low 
book-lined  attic  study  where,  in  his  cherished 
easy-chair  with  his  manuscript  resting  upon  a 
lap-board,  he  did  much  of  his  valuable  work. 

Still  farther  northward,  we  come  to  the  an- 
cient town  of  Aldrich's  "  Bad  Boy"-hood, — im- 
mortalized as  the  "  Rivermouth"  of  his  prose, — 
the  place  of  Longfellow's  "  Lady  Wentworth," 
the  home  of  Hawthorne's  Sir  William  Pep- 
perell ;  and  to  the  picturesque  island  realm  of 
that  "  Princess  of  Thule,"  Celia  Thaxter,  and 
her  gifted  poet-brother  Laighton ; — but  these 
shrines  are  worthy  of  a  separate  pilgrimage. 


140 


OUT  OF  BOSTON 


IV 

WEBSTER'S  MARSHFIELD: 
BROOK  FARM,  ETC 


Scenes  of  the  Old  Oaken  Bucket-Webster' s  Home  and  Grave- 
W here  Emerson  won  his  Wife  —  Home  of  Miss  Peabody 
-  Parkman  -  Miss  Guiney  -  Aldrich"  s  Ponkapog  -  Farm 
of  Ripley" 's  Community  —  Relics  and  Reminiscences. 

/^\NE  day's  excursion  out  of  Boston  is  south- 
ward  through  the  birthplace  and  ancestral 
home  of  the  brilliant  essayist  Quincy  to  the 
boyhood  haunts  of  Woodworth  and  the  scenes 
which  inspired  his  sweetest  lyric.  In  Scituate, 
by  the  village  of  Greenbush,  we  find  the  well 
of  the  '*  Old  Oaken  Bucket"  remaining  at  the 
site  of  the  dwelling  where  the  poet  was  born 
and  reared.  Most  of  the  "  loved  scenes"  of  his 
childhood — the  wide-spreading  pond,  the  ven- 
erable orchard,  the  flower-decked  meadow,  the 
"deep-tangled  wildwood" — may  still  be  seen, 
little  changed  since  he  knew  them ;  but  the  rock 
of  the  cataract  has  been  removed  and  the  cas- 
cade itself  somewhat  altered  by  the  widening  of 
the  highway ;  the  "  cot  of  his  father"  has  given 
place  to  a  modern  farm-house ;  and  the  "  moss- 
141 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

covered  bucket  that  hung  in  the  well"  has  been 
supplanted  by  a  convenient  but  unpoetical  pump. 

A  few  miles  beyond  this  romantic  spot  we 
come  to  the  Marshfield  home  of  Daniel  Webster, 
set  in  the  midst  of  a  pleasant  rural  region, 
not  far  from  the  ancient  abode  of  Governor 
Winslow  of  the  Plymouth  colony.  On  the 
site  of  Webster's  farm-house  of  thirty  rooms — 
destroyed  by  lire  some  years  ago — his  son's 
widow  erected  a  pretty  and  tasteful  modern 
cottage,  in  which  she  preserved  many  relics  of 
the  illustrious  statesman  and  orator,  which  had 
been  rescued  from  the  flames.  Some  of  the 
relics  were  afterward  removed  to  Boston,  and, 
the  family  becoming  extinct  with  the  death  of 
Mrs.  Fletcher  Webster,  the  place  found  an 
appreciatory  proprietor  in  Mr.  Walton  Hall,  a 
Boston  business-man  who  was  reared  in  this 
neighborhood,  where  Webster's  was  "a  name 
to  conjure  by." 

The  objects  connected  with  the  memory  of 
the  statesman  have  been  as  far  as  possible  pre- 
served, and  we  find  the  cottage  partially  furnished 
with  his  former  belongings.  Here  we  see  his 
writing-table,  covered  with  ink-stained  green 
baize ;  his  phenomenally  large  arm-chair  with 
seat  of  leather ;  the  andirons  from  his  study 
fireplace ;  the  heavy  cane  he  used  in  his  walks 
142 


Webster's  Home  and  Grave 


about  the  farm ;  portraits  of  the  great  genius  loci 
— one  of  them  representing  him  in  his  coarse 
farm  attire — and  of  members  of  his  family ;  a 
fine  cabinet  of  beetles  and  butterflies  presented 
to  him  by  the  Emperor  of  Brazil ;  and  a  number 
of  paintings,  articles  of  furniture,  and  bric-a-brac 
which  had  once  been  Webster's. 

Near  the  house  stand  the  great  memorial  elms, 
each  planted  by  Webster's  hand  at  the  death  of 
one  of  his  children.  His  favorite  tree,  beneath 
which  his  coffined  figure  lay  at  his  funeral,  was 
injured  by  the  fire  and  has  since  been  removed. 
Behind  the  house  is  a  pretty  lakelet,  on  whose 
surface — by  his  desire — lights  were  kept  burn- 
ing at  night  during  his  last  illness,  so  that  he 
might  see  them  from  his  bed  in  the  Pink  Room 
where  he  died. 

His  study  window  looked  out  through  a  colon- 
nade of  trees  upon  the  hill-side  cemetery — a 
furlong  distant — where  he  now  sleeps  in  a  spot 
he  loved  and  chose  for  his  sepulchre.  His 
tomb,  on  the  brow  of  the  hill,  is  marked  by  a 
huge  mound  of  earth  crowned  by  a  ponderous 
marble  slab.  The  memorial  stones  about  it 
were  erected  by  him  to  commemorate  his 
family,  already  sleeping  in  the  vault  here  before 
he  came  to  lie  among  them : — all  save  one,  and 
that  one  died  at  Bull  Run. 

H3 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


Not  far  away  lie  Governor  Winslow  and  the 
Peregrine  White  who  was  born  on  the  May- 
flower. From  among  the  neglected  graves  we 
look  abroad  upon  the  acres  Webster  tilled,  the 
creeks  he  fished,  the  meadows  he  hunted,  the 
haunts  of  his  leisure  during  many  years :  on  the 
one  hand,  we  see  a  stretch  of  verdant  pastures 
and  lowly  hills  dotted  by  white  cottages  and 
bounded  by  distant  forests  ;  on  the  other  hand, 
across  the  wave-like  dunes  and  glistening  sands 
we  see  a  silver  rim  flecked  with  white  sails, — 
the  ocean,  whose  low-sounding  monotone,  eter- 
nally responding  to  some  whisper  of  the  infinite, 
mayhap  lulls  the  dreamless  sleepers  beneath  our 
feet. 

Southward  again,  we  come  to  historic  old 
Plymouth,  with  its  many  Puritan  shrines  and 
associations,  which  did  not  prevent  its  becoming 
a  shire-town  of  Transcendentalism.  Here  we 
see  the  house  (framed  in  England,  and  erected 
here  upside  down)  where  Emerson,  the  foun- 
tain-head of  that  great  "wave  of  spirituality,0 
wooed  and  won  Miss  Jackson  to  be  his  wife ; 
and  not  far  away  the  lovely  spot  where,  among 
his  gardens,  groves,  and  orchards,  Marston 
Watson  had  his  "  Hillside"  home, — to  which 
resorted  Emerson,  Theodore  Parker,  Peabody, 
Thoreau,  and  Bronson  Alcott,  and  which  the 
144 


Miss  Peabody — Parkman 


latter  celebrated  in  a  sonnet.  Here,  too,  we 
find  the  church  where  Kendall  preached,  and 
the  farm  of  Morton,  the  earliest  historian  of 
the  Western  world. 

In  the  Boston  suburb  of  Jamaica  Plain  we 
find,  near  the  station,  the  modest  apartments 
where  Miss  Elizabeth  Peabody — the  "  Saint 
Elizabeth"  of  her  friends — passed  her  later  years, 
and  where,  not  many  months  ago,  she  died, 
having  survived  nearly  all  her  associates  in  the 
earlier  struggle  for  the  enlargement  of  the  bounds 
of  spiritual  freedom.  She  had  been  the  intimate 
friend  of  Emerson,  Channing,  Theodore  Parker, 
and  the  rest ;  and  of  the  wider  spirituality 
which  they  proclaimed  she  was  esteemed  a 
prophetess.  Most  of  her  literary  work  was 
done  before  she  came  to  this  home ;  and  the 
latest  literary  effort  of  her  life,  her  autobiog- 
raphy (which  was  undertaken  here  in  age  and 
weariness),  was  frustrated  by  her  increasing  in- 
firmities. 

In  the  same  delightful  suburb  was  the  ideally 
beautiful  home  of  the  historian  Francis  Park- 
man.  His  wide  and  tasteful  dwelling  sur- 
mounted an  elevation  overlooking  a  pretty  lake- 
let, and  was  environed  by  ample  grounds  filled 
with  choicest  shrubbery  and  flowers,  where 
there  were  roods  of  the  roses  and  lilies  he  loved 
k  145 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston. 


and  studied.  In  this  place  he  lived  thirty-four 
years,  and,  although  practically  blind  and  rarely 
free  from  torturing  pain,  he  here  produced  many 
volumes  and  accomplished  the  work  which  places 
him  among  the  foremost  historians  of  the  age. 
In  this  home  he  died  a  year  or  so  ago  :  his 
grounds  having  been  taken  for  a  public  park, 
it  is  now  proposed  to  erect  here  a  bronze  memo- 
rial of  the  great  historian  amid  the  floral  beauty 
he  created  and  cherished. 

In  the  remoter  region  of  Canton,  Thomas 
Bailey  Aldrich  has  a  sometime  summer  home, 
erected  among  enchanting  landscapes,  where  he 
has  pondered  and  written  much  of  his  dainty 
prose  and  daintier  poesy.  The  curious  name 
of  this  rural  retreat  is  preserved  in  the  title 
of  his  entertaining  volume  of  travel-sketches, 
**  From  Ponkapog  to  Pesth."  The  tree  near 
his  door  was  the  home  of  the  pair  of  birds  he 
described  in  the  delightful  sketch  "  Our  New 
Neighbors  at  Ponkapog." 

A  morning's  drive  westward  through  the  shade 
and  sheen  of  a  delectable  urban  district  conveys 
us  to  the  village  of  Auburndale,  where  we  find 
the  tasteful  cottage  home  of  Louise  Imogen 
Guiney,  with  its  French  roofs,  wide  windows, 
square  tower,  and  embosoming  foliage.  Here,  if 
we  come  properly  accredited,  we  may  (or  might 
146 


Miss  Guiney — Brook  Farm 


before  she  became  the  village  postmistress)  see 
the  gifted  poetess  of  "  White  Sail"  and  "  Road- 
side Harp"  and  essayist  of  "  English  Gallery" 
and  "  Prose  Idyls" — a  petite  and  attractive 
young  lady — at  her  desk,  surrounded  by  her 
treasures  of  books  and  bric-a-brac  and  with  the 
portraits  of  many  friends  looking  down  upon 
her  from  the  walls  of  the  square  upper  room 
where  she  writes.  She  has  little  to  say  con- 
cerning her  own  work, — fascinating  as  it  is  to 
her, — but  discourses  pleasantly  on  many  topics 
and  narrates  con  amore  the  history  of  the  pre- 
cious tomes  and  the  literary  relics  she  has  gath- 
ered here,  and  describes  the  traits  and  lineage 
of  her  beloved  canine  pets,  who  have  been  exe- 
crated by  some  of  her  neighbors. 

Nearer  Jamaica  Plain  is  the  quiet  corner  of 
West  Roxbury,  where  the  exalted  community 
of  Brook  Farmers  attempted  to  realize  in  external 
and  material  fashion  their  high  ideals  and  to 
inaugurate  the  precursor  of  an  Arcadian  era.  In 
this  season,  "  the  sweet  o'  the  year,"  we  find 
the  farm  a  delightful  spot,  fully  warranting  Haw- 
thorne's eulogium  in  "  Blithedale  Romance." 
The  songful  stream  which  gives  the  place  its 
name  is  margined  by  verdant  and  sun-kissed 
meads  which  slope  away  to  the  circling  Charles  ; 
on  either  side,  fields  and  picturesque  pastures — 
i47 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 

broken  here  and  there  by  rocky  ledges  and  copse- 
covered  knolls — swell  upward  to  feathery  ac- 
clivities of  pine  and  oak,  with  rugged  escarp- 
ments of  rock.  From  the  elevation  about  the 
farm-house  we  overlook  most  of  the  domain  of 
these  social  reformers, — the  many  acres  of 
woodlands,  the  orchards  and  fields  where  Ripley, 
George  William  Curtis,  Hawthorne,  Dwight, 
Bedford,  Pratt,  Dana,  and  other  transcendental 
enthusiasts  held  sublimated  discourse  while  they 
performed  the  coarsest  farm  drudgery,  applied 
uncelestial  fertilizers,  "  belabored  rugged  fur- 
rows," or  delved  for  the  infinite  in  a  peat-bog. 
Curtis  has  said  "  there  never  were  such  witty 
potato-patches,  such  sparkling  corn-fields ;  the 
weeds  were  scratched  out  of  the  ground  to  the 
music  of  Tennyson  and  Browning."  The  farm- 
house stands  above  the  highway,  and  is  shaded 
by  giant  trees  planted  by  Ripley  and  his  asso- 
ciates. It  is  a  commodious,  antiquated  structure 
of  weather-worn  wood,  two  stories  in  height, 
with  a  vast  attic  beneath  the  sloping  roofs  and 
an  extension  which  has  been  recently  enlarged. 
The  original  edifice  is  a  ponderous  fabric  of 
almost  square  form,  with  an  entrance  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  front,  massive  chimneys  at  either  end, 
and  contains  four  spacious  lower  rooms,  besides 
an  outer  scullery.  Here  we  see  the  sitting-room 
148 


Brook  Farm 


of  the  reformers,  where  at  first  Channing  some- 
times preached  and  the  now  "  Nestor  of  Ameri- 
can journalism"  sang  bass  in  the  choir ;  their 
refectory,  where  Dana  served  as  head-waiter ; 
and  their  brick-paved  kitchen,  where  the  erudite 
Mrs.  Ripley  and  the  soulful  Margaret  Fuller 
sometimes  helped  to  prepare  the  bran  bread  and 
baked  beans  for  the  exalted  brotherhood.  Ad- 
joining is  the  old  "  wash-room,"  where  some 
who  have  since  become  famous  in  literature  or 
politics  pounded  the  soiled  linen  in  a  hogshead 
with  a  heavy  wooden  pestle ;  and  just  without 
is  the  turf-carpeted  yard  where  the  dignified 
and  handsome  Hawthorne,  the  brilliant  Charles 
A.  Dana  (who  certainly  was  the  most  popular 
member  of  the  community),  and  the  genial  Cur- 
tis were  sometimes  seen  hanging  the  moist  gar- 
ments upon  the  lines,  a  truly  edifying  spectacle 
for  gods  and  men.  It  was  from  Curtis's  pockets 
that  the  clothes-pins  sometimes  dropped  during 
the  evening  dances.  Some  of  the  trees  yet  to 
be  seen  near  the  house  were  rooted  from  the 
nursery  established  here  by  Dana. 

This  old  house  was  the  original  "  Hive"  of 
the  community,  who  added  the  extensive  wing 
at  the  back,  but  increasing  numbers  soon  forced 
a  portion  of  the  company  to  swarm,  and  other 
dormitories  were  erected.  Of  these  we  find  ves- 
149 


In  and  Out  of  Literary  Boston 


tiges  of  the  "  Eyrie" — which  was  also  used  as  a 
school-house — upon  a  commanding  ledge  at  a 
little  distance  from  the  house,  and  nearer  the 
grove  where  the  rural  festivals  of  the  association 
were  held.  Of  the  "  Nest,"  the  little  house 
where  Miss  Ripley  lived,  the  "  Cottage,"  where 
Margaret  Fuller  lodged  during  her  sojourns  at  the 
farm,  the  large  barn,  where  social  seances  were  held 
while  the  starry  company  prepared  vegetables 
for  the  market,  and  the  other  steading  erected 
by  the  community,  only  the  cellars  and  broken 
foundations  remain.  In  the  wood  at  some  dis- 
tance from  the  house  is  the  "  Eliot's  Pulpit"  of 
Coverdale's  narrative,  a  mass  of  rock  crowning 
a  knoll  and  having  a  great  fissure  through  its 
core  ;  in  the  forest  beyond  we  may  find  "  Cover- 
dale's  Walk,"  and  the  M  Hermitage"  where  he 
heard  by  accident  the  colloquy  of  Westervelt 
and  Zenobia. 

After  the  day  of  Ripley's  brilliant  colony  the 
broad  acres  of  Brook  Farm  were  tilled  by  the 
town  poor,  and — "  to  what  base  uses  !" — the 
pretty  cottage  of  Margaret  Fuller  became  a 
loathsome  small-pox  pest-house ;  the  rooms  of 
the  "  Hive,"  after  six  years  of  familiarity  with 
ideal  refiners  and  reformers,  became  the  abode 
of  paupers,  and  at  this  day  are  aswarm  with  an 
odorous  multitude  of  German  orphans,  wards 
150 


Brook  Farm 


of  a  Lutheran  society  that  now  owns  the 
place. 

While  the  pilgrim  may  find  but  few  traces  of 
the  physical  labors  of  the  choice  spirits  who 
once  inhabited  this  spot,  the  beneficent  results 
of  the  mental  and  moral  work  here  accom- 
plished— especially  among  the  young — are 
manifest  and  ineffaceable.  These  infertile  fields 
yielded  but  scant  returns  for  the  manual  toil  of 
the  optimistic  philosophers,  but  their  earnest 
strivings  toward  social  and  mental  emancipation 
have  borne  abundant  fruit. 


i5« 


BERKSHIRE  WITH 
HAWTHORNE 


I.  The  Graylock  and  Hoosac 
Region 

II.  Lenox  and  Middle  Berkshire 


I 

THE  GRAYLOCK  AND  HOOSAC 
REGION 


North  Adams  and  about  —  Hawthorne' 's  Acquaintances  and 
Excursions  -  Actors  and  Incidents  of  Ethan  Brand  — 
Kiln  of  Bertram  the  Lime-Burner  -  Natural  Bridge  — 
Graylock  —  Thoreau  —  Hoosac  Mountain  —  Deerfield  Arch 
—  Willi amstoiun  -  Bryant. 

'  I  4HE  Hawthorne  pilgrimage  has  drawn  us  to 
many  shrines  :  the  sunny  scenes  of  "  The 
Marble  Faun,"  the  peaceful  landscapes  of  "  Our 
Old  Home,"  the  now  busy  city  of  "  The  Scarlet 
Letter,"  the  elm-shaded  Salem  of  "  Dr.  Grim- 
shaw"  and  "  The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables," 
the  Manse  of  the  "  Mosses,"  the  Wayside  of 
"Septimius  Felton"  and  "The  Dolliver  Ro- 
mance,"— these  and  many  another  resort  of  the 
subtile  romancer,  in  the  Old  World  and  the 
New,  have  held  our  lingering  feet. 

Amid  the  splendors  of  a  New  England  Sep- 
tember we  follow  him  into  the  "  headlong 
Berkshire"  of  "  Ethan  Brand"  and  "  Tangle- 
wood  Tales." 

Hawthorne  was  more  than  most  writers  in- 
fluenced by  environment ;  the  situations  and 
circumstances  under  which  his  work  was  pro- 
155 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


duced  often  determined  its  tone  and  color,  while 
the  persons,  localities,  and  occurrences  observed 
by  his  alert  senses  in  the  real  world  about  him 
were  skilfully  wrought  into  his  romance.  His 
residence  in  Berkshire  affected  not  only  the 
books  written  there,  but  some  subsequently  pro- 
duced, and  the  scenery  of  this  loveliest  corner  of 
New  England  supplied  the  setting  for  many  of  his 
tales.  Some  of  the  best  passages  of  his  "  Ameri- 
can Note-Books"  are  records  of  his  observations 
in  this  region, — sundry  scenes,  characters,  and 
incidents  being  afterward  literally  transcribed 
therefrom  into  his  fiction, — while  a  few  of  his 
shorter  stories  seem  to  have  been  suggested  by 
legends  once  current  in  Berkshire.  It  passes, 
therefore,  that  for  us  the  greatest  charm  of  this 
realm  of  delights  is  that  all  its  beauties — the 
grandeur  of  its  mountains,  the  enchantment  of 
its  valleys,  the  glamour  of  its  autumn  woods, 
the  sheen  of  its  lakelets,  the  sapphire  of  its 
skies — serve  to  bring  us  into  closer  sympathy 
with  Hawthorne,  to  whom  these  beauties  were 
once  a  familiar  vision. 

He  first  came  to  Berkshire  in  the  summer  of 
1838.  For  thirteen  years  he  had  bravely  "  waited 
for  the  world  to  know"  him.  His  "  Twice- 
Told  Tales"  had  brought  him  little  fame  or 
money,  but  they  had  procured  him  the  friend- 
156 


The  Graylock  and  Hoosac  Region 


ship  of  the  Peabodys,  and  it  would  appear  that 
he  and  the  lovely  Sophia  already  loved  each 
other.  In  a  letter  to  her  sister  Elizabeth,  writ- 
ten early  in  the  summer,  Sophia  says,  "  Haw- 
thorne came  one  morning  for  a  take-leave  call, 
looking  radiant.  He  said  he  was  not  going  to 
tell  any  one,  not  even  his  mother,  where  he 
should  be  for  the  next  months ;  he  thought  he 
should  change  his  name,  so  that  if  he  died  no  one 
would  be  able  to  find  his  gravestone.  We  asked 
him  to  keep  a  journal  while  he  was  gone.  He 
at  first  said  he  would  not  write  anything,  but 
finally  concluded  it  would  suit  very  well  for 
hints  for  future  stories."  It  was  from  his  jour,- 
nal  of  these  months  of  mysterious  retirement 
that,  forty  years  later,  the  gentle  Sophia — then 
his  widow — transcribed  those  pages  of  the 
"  Note-Books'*  which  contain  the  account  of  his 
sojourn  in  upper  Berkshire  and  of  his  observa- 
tions and  meditations  there.  How  far  the  journal 
furnished  "  hints  for  future  stories"  the  literary 
world  well  knows. 

A  few  days  after  this  *1rtake-leave  call"  we 
find  Hawthorne  at  Pittsfield,  where  his  Berk- 
shire saunterings  (and  ours)  fitly  began.  We 
follow  him  northward  along  a  curving  valley 
hemmed  by  mountains  that  slope  upward  to  the 
azure ;  on  the  right  rise  the  rugged  Hoosacs  in 
i57 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


"  Wave-like  walls  that  block  the  sky 
With  tints  of  gold  and  mists  of  bluej" 

on  the  left  loom  the  darkly-wooded  domes  of 
the  Taconics  above  the  bright  upland  pastures, 
while  before  us  grand  old  "  Graylock"  uprears 
his  head  "  shaggy  with  primeval  forest," — his 
gigantic  shape  forming  the  culmination  of  the  su- 
perb landscape.  Hawthorne's  superlative  pleas- 
ure of  beholding  this  grandeur  and  beauty  from 
the  driver's  seat  of  a  stage  and  being  regaled  at 
the  same  time  by  the  converse  of  the  driver  is 
denied  to  us,  but  we  enjoy  quite  as  much  as  did 
Hawthorne  the  little  "  love-pats"  and  passages 
of  a  newly-wedded  pair  of  our  fellow-passengers. 
The  stage  has  disappeared,  the  driver  and  the 
high-stepping  steeds  which  served  him  "  in 
wheel  and  in  whoa"  have  given  place  to  the 
engineer  and  the  locomotive ;  the  changes  of 
the  half-century  since  Hawthorne  journeyed 
here  have  well-nigh  overturned  the  world ;  only 
the  eternal  beauty  of  these  hills  and  the  bewray- 
ing demeanor  of  the  newly-married  remain  ever- 
more unchanged. 

At  North  Adams,  which  the  magician,  "  liking 
indifferent  well,  made  his  head-quarters,"  we  have 
lodgings  near  the  place  of  his  on  the  Main  Street 
and  in  the  domicile  of  one  who,  as  a  lad  of  fourteen 
158 


Hawthorne  at  North  Adams 

years,  had  known  Hawthorne  during  his  stay- 
here.  Apparently  he  did  not  attempt  to  carry 
out  his  plan  of  concealing  his  identity ;  he 
certainly  was  known  to  some  of  the  villagers  as 
the  author  of  "  Twice-Told  Tales,"  and  a  de- 
scendant of  one  of  Hawthorne's  "  seven  doctors 
of  the  place"  recalls  his  delight  on  being  told 
that  the  "  Whig  Tavern  boarder"  was  the  creator 
of  "  The  Gentle  Boy  ;"  and  he  remembers  his 
subsequent  and  consequent  worshipful  espionage 
of  the  wonderful  being.  To  this  espionage  we 
are  indebted  for  some  edifying  details  of  Haw- 
thorne's sojourn  in  upper  Berkshire.  The  world 
has  known  few  handsomer  men  than  Hawthorne 
was  at  this  period  of  his  life, — he  had  been 
styled  Oberon  at  college, — and  our  informant 
recollects  him  as  "  the  most  brilliantly  handsome 
person  he  ever  beheld,"  tall,  dark,  with  an  ex- 
pressive mobile  face  and  a  lustrous  eye  which 
held  something  "  indescribably  more  than  keen- 
ness" in  its  quick  glances.  (Charles  Reade  said 
Hawthorne's  eye  was  "  like  a  violet  with  a  soul 
in  it.")  As  remembered  here,  his  expression 
was  often  abstracted,  sometimes  despondent. 
He  would  sit  for  hours  at  a  time  on  the  broad 
porch  of  the  old  "  North  Adams  House,"  or  in 
a  corner  of  the  bar-room,  silently  smoking  and 
apparently  oblivious  to  his  surroundings,  yet, 
i59 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


as  we  know,  vigilant  to  note  the  oddities  of 
character  and  opinion  he  encountered.  It  is 
certain  that  he  did  not  drink  immoderately  at 
this  time.  There  were  a  few  persons — not  the 
model  men  of  the  community — to  whom  he 
occasionally  unbent  and  whom  he  admitted  to  a 
sort  of  comradeship,  which,  as  his  diary  shows, 
often  became  confessionary  upon  their  part. 
With  these  he  held  prolonged  converse  upon 
the  tavern  porch, — his  part  in  the  conversations 
being  mainly  suggestions  calculated  to  elicit  the 
whimsical  conceits  or  experiences  of  his  com- 
panions,— sitting  the  while  in  the  posture  of  the 
venerable  custom-house  officials,  described  in 
the  sketch  introductory  to  the  "  Scarlet  Letter," 
with  "  chair  tipped  on  its  hind  legs"  and  his 
feet  elevated  against  a  pillar  of  the  porch. 
Among  those  remembered  to  have  been  thus 

favored  was  Captain  C  ,  called  Captain 

Gavett  in  the  "  Note-Books,"  who  dispensed 
metaphysics  and  maple  sugar  from  the  tavern 
steps,  and  a  jolly  blacksmith  named  Wetherel, 
described  by  Hawthorne  as  "  big  in  the  paunch 
and  enormous  in  the  rear,"  who  came  regularly 
to  the  bar  for  his  stimulant.  Another  was  the 
"  lath-like,  round-backed,  rough-bearded,  thin- 
visaged"  stage-driver,  Piatt,  whom  Hawthorne 
honors  as  "  a  friend  of  mine"  in  the  diary,  and 
1 60 


Characters  of  his  Fiction 


whose  acquaintance  he  made  during  the  ride 
from  Pittsfield.  In  later  years  Piatt's  pride  in 
having  known  Hawthorne  eclipsed  even  his  sense 
of  distinction  in  being  (<  the  first  and  only  man 
to  drive  an  ox-team  to  the  top  of  Graylock, 
sir."  He  had  once  been  employed  to  haul  the 
materials  for  an  observatory  up  that  mountain's 
steep  inclines.  Of  the  other  "  hangers-on"  who 
were  wont  to  infest  the  bar-room  and  porch 
fifty  years  ago  and  whom  Hawthorne  depicts  in 
his  journal  and  his  fiction,  few  of  the  present 
generation  of  loungers  in  the  place  have  ever 

heard.     Orrin   ,  the   sportive  widower 

whose  peccadilloes  are  hinted  at  in  the  "  Note- 
Books,"  is  remembered  by  older  residents  of  the 
town,  and  the  "  fellow  who  refused  to  pay  six 
dollars  for  the  coffin  in  which  his  wife  was 
buried"  may  still  be  named  as  the  personifica- 
tion of  meanness.  The  maimed  and  dissolute 
Daniel  Haines — nicknamed  "  Black  Hawk" — 
was  then  a  familiar  figure  in  the  village  streets, 
and  his  unique  history  and  appearance  could  not 
escape  the  notice  of  the  great  romancer  nor  be 
soon  forgotten  by  the  towns-people.  As  Haw- 
thorne says,  "  he  had  slid  down  by  degrees  from 
law  to  the  soap-vat."  Once  a  reputable  lawyer, 
his  bibulous  habits  and  an  accident — his  hand 
being  "  torn  away  by  the  devilish  grip  of  a 
l  161 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


steam-engine" — had  so  reduced  him  that  at  the 
time  Hawthorne  saw  him  he  maintained  him- 
self by  boiling  soap  and  practising  phrenology. 
It  is  remembered  that  he  used  to  "  feel  of 
bumps"  for  the  price  of  a  drink,  and  that,  Haw- 
thorne's head  being  submitted  to  his  manipula- 
tion, he  gravely  assured  the  tavern  company, 
"  This  man  was  created  to  shine  as  a  bank  presi- 
dent," and  then  privately  advised  the  landlord  to 
"  make  that  chap  pay  in  advance  for  his  board." 
A  resident  tells  us  that  this  dirty  and  often 
drunken  Haines  used  to  make  biweekly  visits 
to  his  father's  house,  with  a  cart  drawn  by  dis- 
reputable-looking dogs,  to  receive  fat  in  ex- 
change for  soap.  The  novelist  touches  this  odd 
character  many  times  in  his  journal,  and  utilizes 
it  in  the  romance  of  "  Ethan  Brand,"  where  it 
is  the  "  Lawyer  Giles,  the  elderly  ragamuffin," 
who,  with  the  rest  of  the  lazy  regiment  from 
the  village  tavern,  came  in  response  to  the  sum- 
mons of  the  "  boy  Joe"  to  see  poor  Brand  re- 
turned from  his  long  search  after  the  Unpardon- 
able Sin.  This  "  boy  Joe,"  son  of  «'  Bertram 
the  lime-burner,"  was  also  a  bar-room  character, 
noted  here  by  Hawthorne,  but  obviously  for  a 
different  use  than  that  made  of  him  in  "  Ethan 
Brand," — a  reference  to  him  in  the  "  Note- 
Books"  being  supplemented  by  this  memoran- 
162 


Characters  and  Scenes 


dum :  "  take  this  boy  as  the  germ  of  a  tavern- 
haunter,  a  country  roue,  to  spend  a  wild  and 
brutal  youth,  ten  years  of  his  prime  in  prison 
and  his  old  age  in  the  poor-house. "  This 
sketch  may  have  been  written  in  the  spirit  of 
prophecy,  so  exactly  has  the  life  of  one  bar-room 
boy  coincided  with  Hawthorne's  outline ;  the 
career  of  another  lad  whom  he  here  saw  and  pos- 
sibly had  in  mind  was  happier. 

A  modern  hotel  has  replaced  the  "  Whig 
Tavern"  of  Hawthorne's  time,  and  a  new  set  of 
habitues  now  frequent  its  bar-room ;  another 
generation  of  fat  men  has  succeeded  the  in- 
dividuals whose  breadth  of  back  was  a  marvel 
to  the  novelist,  and  in  the  increased  population 
of  the  place  the  "  many  obese"  would  no  longer 
provoke  comment.  The  lapsing  decades  have 
expanded  the  pretty  and  busy  factory-village  he 
found  into  a  prettier  and  busier  factory-city 
without  materially  changing  its  prevailing  air. 
The  vigorous  young  city  has  not  wholly  out- 
grown the  "  hollow  vale"  walled  in  by  tower- 
ing mountains ;  the  aspect  of  its  grand  environ- 
ment is  therefore  essentially  unaltered,  and  it 
chances  that  there  is  scarcely  a  spot,  in  or  about 
the  town,  which  received  the  notice  of  Haw- 
thorne which  may  not  still  be  identified.  It 
is  our  crowning  pleasure  in  the  resplendent 
163 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 

autumn  days  to  follow  his  thoughtful  step  and 
dreamy  vision  through  town  and  country-side  to 
the  spots  he  frequented  and  described,  thus 
sharing,  in  a  way,  his  companionship  and  be- 
holding through  his  eyes  the  beauties  which  he 
has  depicted  of  mountain  and  vale,  forest  and 
stream.  On  the  summit  of  a  hill  in  the  village 
cemetery,  where  white  gravestones  gleam  amid 
the  evergreens,  the  grave  of  a  child  at  whose 
burial  Hawthorne  assisted  is  pointed  out  by 
one  who  was  present  with  him.  The  well- 
known  author-divine  Washington  Gladden,  some- 
time preached  in  a  near-by  church.  The  ever- 
varying  phases  of  the  heights  which  look  down 
upon  the  town — the  wondrous  play  of  light 
and  shade  upon  the  great  sweeps  of  foliage 
which  clothe  the  mountain-sides,  the  shadows 
chasing  each  other  along  the  slopes  and  changing 
from  side  to  side  as  the  day  declines,  until  the 
vale  lies  in  twilight  while  the  near  summits  are 
gilded  with  sunset  gold,  the  exquisite  cloud-effects 
as  the  fleecy  masses  drift  above  the  ridges  or 
cling  to  the  higher  peaks — were  a  never-failing 
source  of  pleasure  to  Hawthorne,  as  they  are  to 
the  loiterer  of  this  day.  Every  shifting  of  the 
point  of  view  as  we  stroll  in  the  town  reveals 
a  new  aspect  of  its  mountain  ramparts  and 
arouses  fresh  delight.  Hawthorne  thought  the 
164 


Hawthorne's  Rambles 


village  itself  most  beautiful  when  clouds  deeply- 
shaded  the  mountains  while  sunshine  flooded 
the  valley  and,  by  contrast,  made  streets  and 
houses  a  bright,  rich  gold. 

The  investing  mountains  give  to  the  place 
the  "  snug  and  insular"  air  which  Hawthorne 
observed;  from  many  points  it  seems  com- 
pletely severed  from  the  rest  of  the  world.  On 
some  dark  days  sombre  banks  of  cloud  settle 
along  the  ridges  and  apparently  so  strengthen 
and  heighten  the  beleaguering  walls  that  we  re- 
call Hawthorne's  fancy  that  egress  is  impossible 
save  by  "  climbing  above  the  clouds."  However, 
the  railways  tunnel  the  base  of  one  mountain 
and  curve  around  the  flanks  of  others,  while 

"Old  roads  winding,  as  old  roads  will," 

find  easy  grades  about  and  over  the  ramparts, 
so  that  the  bustling  "  Tunnel-city"  is  by  no 
means  isolated  from  the  outside  world. 

The  rambles  among  and  beyond  these  invest- 
ing mountains,  by  which  Hawthorne  made  him- 
self and  ««  Eustace  Bright"  of  "  Wonder-Book" 
and  "  Tanglewood  Tales"  familiar  with  "  rough, 
rugged,  broken,  headlong"  Berkshire,  were  usu- 
ally solitary.  The  before-mentioned  admirer 
of  the  "  Gentle  Boy"  sometimes  offered  to  guide 
the  novelist  to  places  of  interest  in  the  vicinage, 
165 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


but  he  usually  preferred  to  be  alone  with  nature 
and  his  own  reveries.  Once  when  the  lad  pro- 
posed to  pilot  him  to  the  peak  of  Graylock, 
Hawthorne  replied  he  *'  did  not  care  to  soar  so 
high  ;  the  Bellows-Pipe  was  sightly  enough  for 
him."  He  visited  the  latter  point  many  times ; 
it  is  a  long  walk  from  the  village,  and  once 
he  returned  so  late  that  the  hotel  was  closed 
for  the  night  and  our  lad  pommelled  the  door 
for  him  until  the  landlord  descended,  in  wrath 
and  confidentially  scant  attire,  to  admit  the  nov- 
elist. 

One  starless  night  we  were  guided  to  the  kiln 
of  t€  Bertram  the  lime-burner"  which  Haw- 
thorne visited  with  Mr.  Leach, — one  of  several 
kilns  high  up  on  the  steep  slope  without  the 
town,  where  the  marble  of  the  mountain  is 
converted  into  snow-white  lime.  The  graphic 
imagery  of  the  tale  may  all  be  realized  here 
upon  the  spot  where  it  is  laid.  Amid  the  dark- 
ness, the  iron  door  which  encloses  the  glowing 
limestone  apparently  opens  into  the  mountain- 
side, and  seems  a  veritable  entrance  to  the  in- 
fernal regions  whose  lurid  flames  escape  by 
every  crevice.  The  dark  and  silent  figure,  re- 
vealed to  us  by  the  weird  light,  sitting  and 
musing  before  the  kiln,  is  surely  "  Ethan  Brand" 
on  his  solitary  vigil,  intent  on  perilous  thoughts 
1 66 


Ethan  Brand — Graylock 


as  he  looks  into  the  flame,  or  mutely  listening 
to  the  fiend  he  has  evoked  from  the  fire  to  tell 
him  of  the  Unpardonable  Sin ;  or  it  is  the  same 
Brand  returned  to  the  foot  of  Graylock  after 
eighteen  years  of  weary  searching  abroad,  to 
find  the  Sin  in  his  own  heart  and  to  burn  that 
heart  into  snowy  whiteness  and  purity  in  the 
kiln  he  had  watched  so  long.  As  we  ponder 
the  scene  we  would  scarce  be  surprised  to  wit- 
ness the  approach  of  the  village  rabble  led  by 
Joe,  the  old  Jew  exhibiting  his  "  peep-show"  at 
the  foot  of  the  kiln,  and  the  self-pursuing  cur 
violently  chasing  his  own  shortened  tail,  or  to 
hear  the  demoniac  laughter  of  Brand  which 
scattered  the  terror-stricken  rabble  in  the  sur- 
rounding darkness.  Certain  it  is  that,  thirteen 
years  before  he  wrote  the  tale,  Hawthorne  saw 
here,  at  a  kiln  on  the  foot-hill  of  Graylock,  his 
"  Bertram,"  and  heard  the  legend  of  a  demented 
creature  who  threw  himself  into  the  midst  of 
the  circle  of  fire.  The  name  "  Ethan  Brand" 
was  that  of  an  old  resident  of  Hawthorne's 
Salem. 

The  summit  of  Graylock,  whose  rugged  beauty 
has  been  sung  by  Holmes,  Thoreau,  Bryant,  and 
Fanny  Kemble,  had  for  Hawthorne  a  sort  of 
fascination.  From  the  streets  of  the  village, 
from  all  the  ways  by  which  he  sauntered  through 
167 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


the  country-side,  his  eyes  were  continually  turn- 
ing to  that  lofty  height,  observant  of  its  ever- 
changing  aspects.  His  diary  of  the  time  abounds 
with  records  of  its  phases,  presented  in  varying 
conditions  of  cloud  and  sunshine  and  from  dif- 
ferent places  of  prospect,  and  of  the  fanciful 
impressions  suggested  to  his  subtile  thought  by 
each  fresh  and  unfamiliar  appearance.  A  walk 
repeatedly  enjoyed  by  him  is  along  a  primitive 
road  on  the  mountain-side  to  the  southern  end 
of  The  Notch, — M  where  it  slopes  upward  to 
the  skies," — whence  he  could  see  most  of  the 
enchanting  valley  of  Berkshire — with  its  lakes, 
embowered  villages,  and  billowy  expanses  of 
upland  and  mead — extending  between  mountain- 
borders  to  the  great  Dome  which  looms  across 
it  sixty  miles  away.  In  the  distance  he  could 
see  the  crags  of  Bryant's  Monument  Mountain 
— the  "  headless  sphinx"  of  his  own  "  Wonder- 
Book" — rising  above  the  gleaming  lake  whose 
margin  was  to  be  his  later  home. 

Our  route  to  the  peak  of  Graylock  is  that 
taken  by  Hawthorne  and  Thoreau  through  the 
savage  cleft  of  The  Notch.  We  follow  up  a 
dashing  mountain-stream  past  a  charming  cascade 
beneath  darkening  hemlocks,  then  along  a  rough 
road  by  the  houses  whose  inhabitants  Haw- 
thorne thought  "ought  to  be  temperance  people" 
1 68 


Natural  Bridge 


from  the  quality  of  the  water  they  gave  him  to 
drink.  In  the  remoter  parts  of  the  glen  a 
stranger-pedestrian  is  still  a  wonder,  and  will 
be  regarded  as  curiously  as  was  the  romancer. 
From  the  extremity  of  The  Notch,  Graylock 
rises  steeply,  his  sides  clothed  with  forests, 
through  which  we  climb  to  the  summit  and  our 
reward.  From  the  site  of  Thoreau's  bivouac, 
where  Fanny  Kemble  once  declaimed  Romeo 
and  Juliet  to  a  picnic  party,  we  behold  a  scene 
of  unrivalled  vastness  and  beauty, — on  every  side 
peak  soaring  beyond  peak  until  the  shadowy 
outlines  blend  with  the  distant  sky.  The  view 
ranges  from  Grand  Monadnock  and  the  misty 
Adirondacks  to  the  Catskills,  the  Dome  of  Mount 
Washington,  and  the  far-away  hills  of  Connec- 
ticut, while  at  our  feet  smiles  the  bright  valley, 
as  beautiful  as  that  in  which  Rasselas  dwelt. 

A  mile  from  the  town  we  find  one  of  the 
most  picturesque  spectacles  in  New  England, 
the  Natural  Bridge,  to  which  Hawthorne  came 
again  and  again  during  his  sojourn  in  this  region. 
Amid  a  grove  of  pines  apparently  rooted  in 
the  solid  rock,  a  tributary  of  the  Hoosac  has, 
during  measureless  eons  of  time,  worn  in  the 
white  marble  a  chasm  sixty  feet  deep  and  fifteen 
feet  wide,  spanned  at  one  point  by  a  beautifully 
arched  mass  which  forms  a  bridge  high  above 
169 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


the  stream  which  frets  along  the  rock-strewn 
floor  of  the  canyon.  Within  the  ravine  the 
brook  falls  in  a  rainbow-crowned  cascade,  and 
below  this  is  a  placid  pool  with  margins  of 
polished  marble,  where  Hawthorne  once  medi- 
tated a  bath,  but,  alarmed  by  the  approach  of 
visitors,  he  hastily  resumed  his  habiliments, 
"not  caring  to  be  to  them  the  most  curious 
part  of  the  spectacle." 

From  the  deep  bed  of  the  brook  the  gazer 
looks  heavenward  between  lofty  walls  of  crys- 
talline whiteness  which  seem  to  converge  as  they 
rise,  whose  surmounting  crags  jutting  from  the 
verge  are  crowned  by  sombre  evergreens  which 
overhang  the  chasm  and  almost  shut  out  the  sky. 
As  we  traverse  the  gorge  whose  wildness  so 
impressed  Hawthorne  and  listen  to  the  re-echo- 
ing roar  of  the  now  diminished  stream,  we  are 
reminded  of  his  conceit  that  the  scene  is  "  like 
a  heart  that  has  been  rent  asunder  by  a  torrent 
of  passion  which  has  raged  and  left  ineffaceable 
traces,  though  now  there  is  but  a  rill  of  feeling 
at  the  bottom. " 

Our  way  back  to  the  town  is  along  a  riotous 
stream  which  took  strong  hold  upon  the  liking 
of  the  novelist,  by  which  he  often  walked  and 
in  whose  cool  depths  he  bathed.  His  brief 
descriptions  of  its  secluded  and  turbulent  course, 
170 


Incidents  and  Characters  of  Tales 


through  resounding  hollows,  amid  dark  woods, 
under  pine-crowned  cliffs, — "  talking  to  itself  of 
its  own  wild  fantasies  in  the  voice  of  solitude 
and  the  wilderness," — although  written  at  the 
time  but  for  his  own  perusal,  are  among  the 
gems  of  the  language.  Farther  down,  the  bois- 
terous stream  is  now  subdued  and  harnessed  by- 
man  and  made  to  turn  wheels  of  factories ;  its 
limpid  waters  are  discolored  by  dye-stuffs ;  its 
beauty  is  lost  with  its  freedom  ;  it  becomes  useful 
and — ugly. 

One  day  our  excursion  is  into  the  romantic 
valley  of  the  Deerfield  by  the  old  stage-road 
over  the  Hoosac  range,  the  route  which  Haw- 
thorne took  with  his  friends  Birch  and  Leach. 
The  many  turns  by  which  the  road  accom- 
plishes the  ascent  afford  constantly  varying 
vistas  of  the  valley  out  of  which  we  rise,  and 
progressively  widening  prospects  of  the  forest- 
clad  mountains  beyond.  At  the  summit  we  are 
in  the  centre  of  the  magnificent  panorama  of 
mountains — glowing  now  with  autumnal  crim- 
son and  gold — which  extorted  from  Henry 
Clay  the  declaration  that  he  had  "  never  beheld 
anything  so  beautiful." 

On  the  bare  and  wind-swept  plain  which  lies 
along  the  summit  are  a  few  farm-dwellings. 
Among  these  at  the  time  of  Hawthorne's  visit 
171 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


— before  the  great  tunnel  had  pierced  the  moun- 
tain and  superseded  the  stage-route — was  a 
homely  wayside  inn,  afterward  a  farm-house,  at 
whose  bar  passengers  were  wont  to  "  wet  their 
whistles."  It  may  be  assumed  that  the  ro- 
mancer and  his  companions  failed  not  to  con- 
form to  this  time-honored  custom,  for  it  was  in 
that  rude  bar-room — since  a  farm-kitchen — that 
Hawthorne  met  the  itinerant  Jew  with  a  diorama 
of  execrable  scratchings  which  he  carried  upon 
his  back  and  exhibited  as  "  specimens  of  the 
fine  arts ;"  in  that  room  also  the  novelist  wit- 
nessed the  whimsical  performance  of  the  usually 
sensible  and  sedate  old  dog,  who  periodically 
broke  out  in  an  infuriated  pursuit  of  his  own 
tail,  **  as  if  one  half  of  his  body  were  at 
deadly  enmity  with  the  other. "  These  inci- 
dents were  carefully  noted  at  the  time  for  pos- 
sible future  use,  and  in  such  choice  diction  that 
when,  many  years  afterward,  he  wove  them  into 
the  fabric  of  a  tale  of  "  The  Snow  Image" 
volume,  he  transcribed  them  from  his  diary  to 
his  manuscript  essentially  unchanged.  This  in- 
stance illustrates  the  method  of  this  consummate 
literary  artist  and  his  alertness  to  perceive  and 
utilize  the  details  of  real  life.  His  journals 
abundantly  show  that  he  was  by  no  means  the 
aphelxian  dreamer  he  has  been  adjudged. 
172 


Deerfield  Arch — Williamstown 


As  we  descend  into  the  deep  valley  we  find  a 
wild  gulf  where  a  brooklet  from  the  top  of 
Hoosac  falls  a  hundred  feet  into  a  rock-bordered 
pool,  whence  it  hastens  to  lose  itself  in  the 
river ;  and  a  mile  or  two  farther  along  the  Deer- 
field  we  come  to  the  Natural  Arch  which  Haw- 
thorne visited.  It  is  in  one  of  the  wildest  parts 
of  the  picturesque  valley,  where  mountain-walls 
rise  a  thousand  feet  on  either  side.  Through 
a  mass  of  rock  projecting  from  the  margin  the 
stream  has  wrought  for  itself  a  symmetrically 
arched  passage  as  large  as  and  very  like  the  door- 
way of  an  Old- World  cathedral.  The  summit 
of  the  arch  and  the  water-worn  pillars  upon 
either  side  display  "  pot-holes"  and  other  evi- 
dences of  erosion,  and  in  the  bed  of  the  current 
lie  fragments  of  similarly  attrite  rocks  which 
seem  to  indicate  that  at  some  period  a  series  of 
arches  spanned  the  entire  space  from  mountain 
to  mountain.  Hawthorne's  pleasing  fancy  makes 
this  arch  the  entrance  to  an  enchanted  palace 
which  has  all  vanished  except  the  door-way 
that  "  now  opens  only  into  nothingness  and 
empty  space." 

On  other  days  our  saunterings  follow  Haw- 
thorne's to  beautiful  Williamstown  and  through 
the  picturesque  scenery  which  environs  it. 
Within  the  park-like  village  the  alma  mater  of 
173 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


Bryant,  Garfield,  and  Hawthorne's  **  Eustace 
Bright"  stands  embowered  in  noble  elms  and 
overlooked  by  mighty  Graylock.  Viewed  from 
here,  Emerson  thought  Graylock  "  a  serious 
mountain."  Thoreau  considered  its  proximity 
worth  at  least  "  one  endowed  professorship  ;  it 
were  as  well  to  be  educated  in  the  shadow  of  a 
mount  as  in  more  classic  shades.  Some  will 
remember  not  only  that  they  went  to  the  college 
but  that  they  went  to  the  mountain."  Haw- 
thorne visited  both.  At  the  college  commence- 
ment we  find  him  more  attentive  to  the  eccen- 
tric characters  in  the  assemblage  without  the 
church  than  to  the  literary  exercises  within,  as 
evidenced  by  his  piquant  description  of  the 
enterprising  pedler  with  the  "  heterogeny"  of 
wares,  the  gingerbread  man,  the  negroes,  and 
other  oddities  of  the  out- door  company. 

About  us  here  lie  the  scenes  which  stirred 
in  William  Cullen  Bryant  that  intense  love  of 
nature  which  inspired  his  best  stanzas.  A  win- 
some walk  brings  us  to  a  sequestered  glen  where 
a  brooklet  winds  amid  moss-covered  rocks  and 
dainty  ferns,  and  mirrors  in  its  clear  pools  the 
overhanging  boughs  and  the  patches  of  azure ; 
this  was  a  favorite  haunt  of  the  youthful  Bryant, 
and  here  he  pondered  or  composed  his  earlier 
poems,  including  some  portion  of  the  matchless 
i74 


Bryant — Emerson 


M  Thanatopsis."  Here  Emerson,  lingering  un- 
der the  spell  of  the  spot,  was  moved  to  recite 
Wordsworth's  "  Excursion"  to  a  companion, 
who  must  evermore  feel  an  enviable  thrill  when 
he  recalls  the  exquisite  lines  falling  from  the 
lips  of  the  M  great  evangel  and  seer"  amid  the 
loveliness  of  such  a  scene. 


t 


'75 


II 

LENOX  AND  MIDDLE  BERK- 
SHIRE 

Beloved  of  the  Litterateurs  -  La  Maison  Rouge  -  Where 
The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables  was  written— Wonder- 
Book  and  Tanglewood  Scenes  —  The  Bowl  —  Beecher  s 
Laurel  Lake  -  Kemble  -  Bryant's  Monument  Mountain  — 
Stockbridge  —  Catherine  Sedgwick  —  Melville"  s  Piazza 
and  Chimney  —  Holmes  —  Longfellow  —  Pittsfield. 

WE  have  only  to  accompany  Eustace  Bright 
of"  Wonder-Book"  from  Williams  Col- 
lege to  his  home,  where  Catherine  Sedgwick's 
"  Stockbridge  Bowl"  nestles  among  the  summer- 
enchanted  hills  of  central  Berkshire,  to  find  the 
abode  of  Hawthorne  during  the  most  fertile 
period  of  his  life.  This  region  of  inspiring 
landscapes  has  long  been  a  favorite  residence  of 
litterateurs.  Here  Jonathan  Edwards  compiled 
his  predestined  treatises ;  here  Catherine  Sedg- 
wick wrote  the  romances  which  charmed  her 
generation ;  here  Elihu  Burritt  "  the  Learned 
Blacksmith,"  wrought  out  the  "Sparks"  that 
made  him  famous  ;  here  Bryant  composed  his 
best  stanzas  and  made  Monument  Mountain  and 
Green  River  classic  spots ;  here  Henry  Ward 
Beecher  indited  many  "  Star  Papers ;"  here  Her- 
176 


Hawthorne's  Return  to  Berkshire 


man  Melville  produced  his  sea-tales  and  brilliant 
essays ;  here  Headley  and  Holmes,  Lowell  and 
Longfellow,  Curtis  and  James,  Audubon  and 
Whipple,  Mrs.  Sigourney  and  Martineau,  Fanny 
Kemble  and  Frederika  Bremer,  the  gifted  sisters 
Goodale,  and  many  other  shining  spirits,  have 
had  home  or  haunt  and  have  invested  the  scenery 
with  the  splendors  of  their  genius.  Half  a 
score  of  this  galaxy  were  in  Berkshire  at  the 
time  of  Hawthorne's  residence  there. 

After  his  sojourn  in  northern  Berkshire  he 
returned  to  Salem,  where  he  married  the  lovely 
Sophia  Peabody,  endured  some  years  of  custom- 
house drudgery,  and  wrote  the  "  Scarlet  Letter," 
which  made  him  famous  :  he  then  sought  again 
the  seclusion  of  the  mountains. 

Poverty,  which  he  had  long  and  bravely 
endured,  has  been  assigned  as  the  cause  of  his 
removal  to  the  humble  Berkshire  abode  in  1850 ; 
one  writer  refers  to  the  slenderness  of  his  larder 
here,  another  says  the  rent  for  his  poor  dwelling 
was  paid  by  his  friends,  another  that  the  rent  was 
remitted  by  the  owner,  who  was  his  friend.  But 
the  success  of  the  "  Scarlet  Letter"  had  relieved 
the  necessitous  condition  of  its  author ;  and  his 
landlord  here — Tappan  of  '*  Tanglewood" — 
testifies  and  Hawthorne's  letters  show  that  he 
was  able  to  pay  his  rent.  His  motive  in  return- 
m.  177 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


ing  to  Berkshire  is  stated  in  a  letter  to  Bridge : 
"  I  have  taken  a  house  in  Lenox — I  long  to  get 
into  the  country,  for  my  health  is  not  what  it 
has  been.  An  hour  or  two  of  labor  in  a  garden 
and  a  daily  ramble  in  country  air  would  keep 
me  all  right."  Doubtless,  too,  he  hoped  to  find 
the  quiet  and  seclusion  of  the  place  favorable 
for  his  work. 

The  habitation  to  which  he  brought  his 
family  he  describes  as  "  the  very  ugliest  little 
bit  of  an  old  red  farm-house  you  ever  saw," 
ft  the  most  inconvenient  and  wretched  hovel  I 
ever  put  my  head  in."  His  wife's  letters  char- 
acterize it,  "  the  reddest  and  smallest  of 
houses,"  with  such  a  low  stud  that  she  "  fears 
to  be  crushed." 

In  later  years  we  have  found  it  scarcely 
changed  since  Hawthorne's  occupancy ;  it  was 
indeed  of  the  humblest  and  plainest, — a  low- 
eaved,  one-and-a-half-storied  structure,  with  a 
lower  wing  at  the  side,  dingy  red  in  color,  with 
window-shutters  of  green.  The  interior  was 
cosy  and  more  commodious  than  the  exterior 
would  indicate,  and  one  could  readily  conceive 
that  the  artistic  taste  and  deft  fingers  of  Mrs. 
Hawthorne  might  create  here  the  idyllic  home 
her  letters  portray.  We  have  been  indebted 
to  the  courtesy  of  Hawthorne's  friend  Tappan 
178 


His  Home  and  Study 


for  glimpses  of  the  rooms  which  Mrs.  Haw- 
thorne had  already  made  familiar  to  us :  the 
tiny  reception-room,  where  she  "  sewed  at  her 
stand  and  read  to  the  children  about  Christ ;" 
-  the  drawing-room,  where  she  disposed  "  the 
embroidered  furniture,"  and  where,  in  the  far- 
ther corner,  stood  "  Apollo  with  his  head  tied 
on ;"  the  dining-room,  where  the  "  Pembroke 
table  stood  between  the  windows the  small 
boudoir,  with  its  enchanting  outlook ;  the  "  golden 
chamber"  where  the  baby  Rose  was  born ;  the 
room  of  the  "  little  lady  Una ;"  and  the  low, 
dingy  apartment  which  was  the  study  of  the 
master-genius.  Of  this  room  she  says,  "  it  can 
boast  of  nothing  but  his  presence  in  the  morn- 
ing and  the  picture  out  of  the  window  in  the 
evening."  His  secretary  was  so  placed  that  as 
he  sat  at  his  work  he  could  look  out  upon  a 
landscape  of  forest  and  meadow,  lake  and  moun- 
tain, as  beautiful  as  a  poet's  dream.  It  was  the 
exquisite  loveliness  of  this  scene — which  Haw- 
thorne thought  surpassed  all  others  in  Berkshire 
— that  for  a  time  reconciled  him  to  the  deficien- 
cies of  his  situation  here. 

Monument  Mountain,  looming  almost  across 
the  valley,  is  the  most  prominent  feature  of  this 
view,  and  it  was  from  his  study  window  that 
he  noted  most  of  its  varying  aspects  which  are 
179 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


depicted  in  the  "  Wonder-Book"  and  in  his  let- 
ters and  journals.  Its  contour  is  to  him  that  of 
a  "huge,  headless  sphinx,"  and  when — as  on 
the  days  we  beheld  it  from  his  window — it 
blazes  from  base  to  summit  with  the  resplendent 
hues  of  autumn,  his  fancy  suggested  that  "  the 
sphinx  is  wrapped  in  a  rich  Persian  shawl ;" 
with  the  sunshine  upon  it,  "  it  has  the  aspect 
of  burnished  copper ;"  now  it  has  "  a  fleece  of 
sun-brightened  mist,"  again  it  seems  "  founded 
on  a  cloud ;"  on  other  days  it  is  "  enveloped  as 
if  in  the  smoke  of  a  great  battle."  Upon  the 
pane  through  which  he  had  looked  upon  these 
changeful  phases  his  hand  inscribed,  "  Na- 
thaniel Hawthorne,  February  9,  1851." 

He  could  scarcely  have  found  a  lovelier  loca- 
tion for  his  home.  The  valley,  which  some- 
times seemed  to  him  "  a  vast  basin  filled  with 
sunshine  as  with  wine,"  is  enclosed  by  groups 
of  mountains  piled  and  terraced  to  the  horizon. 
As  we  behold  them  in  the  splendor  of  the 
October  days,  great  patches  of  sunshine  and 
sable  cloud-shadows  flit  along  the  glowing  slopes 
in  the  sport  of  the  wind.  On  the  one  side,  the 
ground  sweeps  upward  from  the  cottage  site  to 
the  "  Bald  Summit"  of  the  "  Wonder-Book ;"  on 
the  other,  a  meadow — as  long  as  the  finger  of 
the  giant  of  "  Three  Golden  Apples" — slopes 
180 


Site  of  his  Little  Red  House 


to  the  lake  a  furlong  distant.  That  beautiful 
water,  sung  by  Sigourney,  Sedgwick,  and  Fanny 
Kemble,  stretches  its  bays  three  miles  among 
the  hills  to  the  southward  and  mirrors  its  own 
wooded  margins  and  the  farther  mountains. 
Beyond  the  lake,  rising  in  mid-air  like  a  great 
gray  wall,  are  the  sheer  precipices  of  Monu- 
ment Mountain,  and  in  the  hazy  distance  the 
loftier  Taconics  uprear  their  grand  Dome  in  the 
illimitable  blue. 

Of  "  La  Maison  Rouge"  of  Hawthorne's 
letters,  the  pilgrim  of  to-day  finds  only  the 
blackened  and  broken  foundation  walls :  a  de- 
vouring fire,  from  which  Tappan  saved  little  of 
his  furniture,  has  laid  it  low.  These  walls 
(which  remain  only  because  relic-hunters  cannot 
easily  carry  them  away)  measurably  indicate  the 
form  and  dimensions  of  the  cottage  and  its  gen- 
eral arrangement.  Its  site  is  close  upon  the 
highway,  from  which  it  is  partially  screened  by 
evergreen  trees.  The  gate  of  the  enclosure  is 
of  course  an  unworthy  successor  to  that  upon 
which  Fields  found  Hawthorne  swinging  his 
children,  but  these  near-by  elms  have  shaded 
the  great  romancer,  the  tallest  of  the  evergreens 
is  the  tree  his  wife  thought  "  full  of  a  thousand 
memories/'  and  all  about  the  spot  cluster  re- 
minders of  the  simple,  healthful  life  Hawthorne 
181 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


led  here.  Here  are  the  garden  ground  he  tilled 
and  where  he  buried  the  pet  rabbit  "  Bunny 
the  "  patch,"  ploughed  for  him  by  Tappan, 
where  he  raised  beans  for  himself  and  corn  for 
his  hens  (he  had  learned  something  of  agricult- 
ure at  Brook  Farm,  albeit  it  was  said  there  he 
could  do  nothing  but  feed  the  hogs)  ;  the  now 
great  fruit-trees  whose  leaden  labels  little  Julian 
destroyed,  as  Tappan  remembers ;  the  place  of 
the  "  scientific  hennery,"  fitted  up  by  the  "  Man 
of  Genius  and  the  Naval  Officer," — Hawthorne 
and  Horatio  Bridge ;  the  long  declivity  where 
the  novelist  as  well  as  his  Eustace  Bright  used 
to  coast  "  in  the  nectared  air  of  winter"  with 
the  children  of  the  "  Wonder-Book  ;"  the  leafy 
woods — his  refuge  from  visitors — where  he 
walked  with  his  children  and  where  Bright 
nutted  with  the  little  Pringles ;  the  lake-shore 
where  Hawthorne  loitered  or  lay  extended  in 
the  shade  during  summer  hours,  "  smoking  cigars, 
reading  foolish  novels,  and  thinking  of  nothing 
at  all,"  while  the  children  played  about  him  or 
covered  his  chin  and  breast  with  long  grasses  to 
make  him  "  look  like  the  mighty  Pan." 

Near  by  are  other  friends  he  has  made  known 
to  us.     Yonder  copse  shades  a  narrow  glen 
whose  braes  border  a  brooklet  winding  and 
chattering  on  its  way  to  the  lake ;  this  glen  was 
182 


Tanglewood  and  Wonder-Book  Scenes 


a  summer  haunt  of  Hawthorne,  where  he  doubt- 
less pondered  much  of  his  work.  Here  he 
brought  his  children  "  to  play  with  the  brook" 
and  helped  them  to  build  water-falls,  or  reclined 
in  the  shade  and  told  them  stories  as  described  in 
the  "  Wonder-Book,"— for  this  is  the  "  dell  of 
Shadow-Brook,"  where  the  children  picnicked 
with  Bright  and  where  he  told  them  the  story 
of  "  The  Golden  Touch"  on  such  an  afternoon 
as  this,  on  which  we  behold  the  dell  thickly 
strewn  with  golden  leaves,  as  if  King  Midas  had 
newly  emptied  his  coffers  there. 

Yonder  mansion  of  Hawthorne's  landlord, 
just  beyond  the  highway,  is  "  Tanglewood," 
— place  of  the  Pringles'  home  and  still  the 
abode  of  Tappan's  daughters, — where  Bright 
spent  his  vacations  and  where  Hawthorne  makes 
him  tell  many  of  the  "  Tales."  The  view  de- 
scribed on  the  porch,  where  the  "  Gorgon's 
Head"  was  narrated,  is  the  one  Hawthorne  saw 
from  his  study  window.  Glimpses  of  various 
rooms  of  the  mansion  which  Tappan  then  in- 
habited and  called  "  Highwood"  are  prefixed  to 
the  stories  told  in  them.  Beyond  "  Tangle- 
wood" steeply  rises  an  eminence  whose  bare 
acclivity  Hawthorne  often  climbed  with  his 
family, — the  "  Bald  Summit"  where  the  Pringles 
listened  to  the  tale  of  "  The  Chimera."  We 
183 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


ascend  by  the  novelist's  accustomed  way  "  through 
Luther  Butler's  orchard,"  and  are  repaid  by  a 
view  extending  from  the  mountains  of  Vermont 
to  the  Catskills  and  deserving  the  high  praise 
Hawthorne  bestowed.  A  golden  cloud  floating 
close  to  Graylock's  shaggy  head  reminds  us 
of  Hawthorne's  conceit  that  a  mortal  might 
step  from  the  mountain  to  the  cloud  and  thus 
ascend  heavenly  heights.  The  farther  ranges 
enclose  a  valley  of  wave-like  hills, — which  look 
as  if  a  tumultuous  ocean  had  been  transfixed  and 
solidified, — dotted  with  farmsteads  and  pictu- 
resque villages  whose  white  spires  rise  from 
embowering  trees.  At  our  feet  the  "  Bowl" 
ripples  and  scintillates,  farther  away  the  "  Echo 
Lake"  of  Christine  Nilsson  and  many  smaller 
lakelets  "open  their  blue  eyes  to  the  sun," 
while  the  placid  stream,  fringed  by  overhanging 
willows,  circles  here  and  there  through  the 
valley  like  a  shining  ribbon.  Here  we  may 
realize  the  immensity  of  Hawthorne's  giant  in 
the  "  Three  Golden  Apples,"  who  was  so  tall 
he  **  might  have  seated  himself  on  Taconic  and 
had  Monument  Mountain  for  a  footstool." 

Not  far  away,  near  another  shore  of  the 
shimmering  "  Bowl,"  that  versatile  genius  "  Carl 
Benson" — Charles   Astor    Bristed — dwelt  for 
some  time  in  a  quaint  old  farm-house  which  has 
184 


Resorts  and  Reminiscences 

since  been  destroyed  by  fire,  and  here  accom- 
plished some  of  his  literary  work.  Laurel  Lake 
(the  Scott's  Pond  of  Hawthorne's  "  Note- 
Books"),  where  Beecher  "  bought  a  hundred 
acres  to  lie  down  upon," — and  called  them 
Blossom  Farm  in  the  '*  Star  Papers"  written 
there, — was  another  resort  of  Hawthorne.  We 
find  it  a  pretty  water,  although  its  margins  are 
mostly  denuded  of  large  trees.  A  bright  matron 
of  the  vicinage,  who,  when  a  child,  thought  the 
author  of  the  "Wonder-Book"  the  "  greatest  man 
in  the  world  save  only  Franklin  Pierce,"  lived 
then  by  Hawthorne's  road  to  Laurel  Lake. 
Her  admiration  for  him  (heightened  by  his 
intimacy  with  Pierce)  led  her  to  daily  watch 
the  road  by  which  he  would  come  from  Tangle- 
wood,  and  when  she  saw  him  approaching — 
which  would  be  twice  a  week  in  good  weather 
— she  would  go  into  the  yard  and  reverently 
gaze  at  him  until  his  swift  gait  had  carried  him 
out  of  sight.  To  her  he  was  a  tall,  dark  man 
with  a  handsome  clean-shaven  face  and  lustrous 
eyes  which  saw  nothing  but  the  ground  directly 
before  him,  habitually  dressed  in  black,  with  a 
wide-brimmed  soft  hat.  Usually  his  walk  was 
solitary,  but  sometimes  Herman  Melville,  who 
was  well  known  in  the  neighborhood,  was  his 
companion,  and  one  autumn  he  was  twice  or 
185 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 

thrice  accompanied  by  M  a  light  spare  man," — 
the  poet  Ellery  Channing.  Once  Hawthorne 
strode  past  toward  the  lake  when  Fanny  Kemble, 
who  lived  near  by,  rode  her  black  steed  by  his 
side  and  "  seemed  to  be  doing  all  the  talking" 
— she  was  capable  of  that — and  "  was  talking 
politics."  Having  secured  a  Democratic  auditor, 
she  doubtless  "  improved  the  occasion"  with 
her  habitual  vivaciousness.  A  neighbor  of  Haw- 
thorne's tells  us  this  incident  of  the  following 
year,  when  the  novelist's  friend  Pierce  had  been 
named  for  the  Presidency.  One  dark  night  this 
neighbor  went  on  foot  to  a  campaign  lecture  at 
Lenox  Furnace.  At  its  close,  he  essayed  to 
shorten  the  homeward  walk  by  a  "  short  cut" 
across  the  fields,  and,  of  course,  lost  his  way. 
Descrying  a  light,  he  directed  his  steps  toward 
it,  but  found  himself  involved  in  a  labyrinth  of 
obstacles,  and  had  to  make  so  many  detours  that 
when  he  finally  reached  the  house  whence  the 
light  proceeded,  and  when  in  response  to  his 
hail  the  door  was  opened  by  Kemble  herself, 
he  was  so  distraught  and  amazed  at  being  lost 
among  his  own  farms  that  he  could  hardly  ex- 
plain his  plight;  but  she  quickly  interrupted 
his  incoherent  account :  "  Yes,  I  see,  poor  be- 
nighted man !  you've  been  to  a  Democratic 
meeting ;  no  wonder  you  are  bewildered  !  Now 
186 


Fanny  Kemble — Monument  Mountain 


I'll  lend  you  a  good  Whig  lantern  that  will  light 
you  safe  home."  We  find  Mrs.  Kemble-But- 
ler's  "  Perch" — as  she  named  her  home  here — 
a  little  enlarged,  but  not  otherwise  changed  since 
the  time  of  her  occupancy.  She  was  a  general 
favorite,  and  her  dark  steed,  which  had  cost  her 
the  proceeds  of  a  volume  of  her  poems,  used  to 
stop  before  every  house  in  the  vicinage.  She 
often  came,  habited  in  a  sort  of  bloomer  cos- 
tume which  shocked  some  of  her  friends,  to 
fish  in  the  "  Bowl"  at  the  time  Hawthorne 
dwelt  by  its  shore. 

The  death  of  Louis  Kossuth,  some  time  ago, 
reminded  her  former  neighbors  here  that  she  led 
the  dance  with  him  at  a  ball  in  Lenox,  when 
the  exiled  patriot  was  a  guest  of  the  Sedgwicks. 

Our  approach  to  Monument  Mountain  is 
along  one  of  those  sequestered  by-ways  which 
Hawthorne  loved,  with  "  an  unseen  torrent 
roaring  at  an  unseen  depth"  near  by.  A  rift  in 
the  morning  mists  which  enshroud  the  valley  dis- 
plays the  mountain  summit  bathed  in  sunshine. 
We  ascend  by  Bryant's  "  path  which  conducts 
up  the  narrow  battlement  to  the  north,"  the 
same  along  which  Hawthorne  and  his  friends — 
Holmes,  James  T.  Fields,  Sedgwick,  and  the 
rest — were  piloted  by  the  historian  Headley  on  a 
summer's  day  more  than  forty  years  ago.  Stand- 
187 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


ing  upon  the  beetling  verge,  which  is  scarred  and 
splintered  by  thunderbolts  and  overhangs  a  preci- 
pice of  five  hundred  feet  or  more,  we  look 
abroad  upon  a  landscape  of  wondrous  expanse 
and  beauty.  Here  we  may  realize  all  the  pros- 
pect Bryant  portrayed  as  he  stood  upon  this 
spot : 

"  A  beautiful  river 
Wanders  amid  the  fresh  and  fertile  meads  j 

On  either  side 
The  fields  swell  upward  to  the  hills  ;  beyond, 
Above  the  hills,  in  the  blue  distance,  rise 
The  mighty  columns  with  which  earth  props  heaven.'* 

In  the  middle  distance,  across  the  Bowl,  which 
gleams  a  veritable  "  mountain  mirror,"  we  see 
the  site  of  the  home  whence  Hawthorne  so 
often  looked  upon  these  cliffs.  Yonder  de- 
tached pinnacle,  rising  from  the  base  of  the 
precipice  beneath  us,  is  the  "  Pulpit  Rock" 
which  Catherine  Sedgwick  christened  when 
Hawthorne's  party  picnicked  here ;  from  the 
crag  projecting  from  the  verge  Fanny  Kemble 
declaimed  Bryant's  poem,  and  Herman  Mel- 
ville, bestriding  the  same  rock  for  a  bowsprit, 
"  pulled  and  hauled  imaginary  ropes"  for  the 
amusement  of  the  company.  Among  these 
splintered  masses  the  company  lunched  that  day 
and  drank  quantities  of  Heidsieck  to  the  health 
188 


Hawthorne  at  Stockbridge 


of  the  "  dear  old  poet  of  Monument  Moun- 
tain." On  the  east,  almost  within  sight  from 
this  eminence,  is  the  spot  where  he  was  born, 
near  the  birthplaces  of  Warner  and  the  gifted 
Mrs.  Howe. 

Another  day  we  follow  the  same  brilliant 
party  of  Hawthorne's  friends  through  the  Stock- 
bridge  Ice  Glen, — a  narrow  gorge  which  cleaves 
a  rugged  mountain  from  base  to  summit,  its  riven 
sides  being  apparently  held  asunder  by  immense 
rocky  masses  hurled  upon  each  other  in  wild  con- 
fusion. Beneath  are  weird  grottos  and  great  re- 
cesses which  the  sun  never  penetrates,  and  within 
these  we  make  our  way — clambering  and  sliding 
over  huge  boulders — through  the  heart  of  the 
mountain.  One  of  Hawthorne's  company  here 
testifies  that  in  all  the  extemporaneous  jollity  of 
the  scramble  through  the  glen  the  usually  silent 
novelist  was  foremost,  and,  being  sometimes  in 
the  dark,  dared  use  his  tongue, — "  calling  out 
lustily  and  pretending  that  certain  destruction 
threatened  us  all.  I  never  saw  him  in  better 
spirits  than  throughout  this  day." 

From  the  glen  we  trace  Hawthorne  to  the 
staid  old  house  of  Burr's  boyhood,  where  lived 
and  wrote  Jonathan  Edwards,  and  the  statelier 
dwelling  whence  Catherine  Sedgwick  gave  her 
tales  to  the  world.  Near  by  we  find  the  grave 
189 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


where  she  lies  amid  the  scenes  of  her  own 
"  Hope  Leslie,"  and  not  far  from  the  sojourn 
of  her  gifted  niece  whose  translation  of  Sand's 
"  Fadette"  has  been  so  well  received.  Over- 
looking the  village  is  the  summer  residence  of 
Field  of  the  "  Evangelist," — author  of  the  de- 
lightful books  of  travel. 

Farther  away  is  a  little  farm-house,  with  a 
"  huge,  corpulent,  old  Harry  VIII.  of  a  chim- 
ney," to  which  Hawthorne  was  a  frequent  visi- 
tor,— the  "  Arrow-Head"  of  Herman  Melville. 
"  Godfrey  Graylock"  says  the  friendship  be- 
tween Hawthorne  and  Melville  originated  in 
their  taking  refuge  together,  during  an  electric 
shower,  in  a  narrow  cleft  of  Monument  Moun- 
tain. They  had  been  coy  of  each  other  on  ac- 
count of  Melville's  review  of  the  "  Scarlet  Let- 
ter" in  Duyckinck's  Literary  World,  but  during 
some  hours  of  enforced  intercourse  and  pro- 
pinquity in  very  contracted  quarters  they  dis- 
covered in  each  other  a  correlation  of  thought 
and  feeling  which  made  them  fast  friends  for 
life.  Thereafter  Melville  was  often  at  the  little 
red  house,  where  the  children  knew  him  as 
"  Mr.  Omoo,"  and  less  often  Hawthorne  came 
to  chat  with  the  racy  romancer  and  philosopher 
by  the  great  chimney.  Once  he  was  accom- 
panied by  little  Una — "  Onion"  he  sometimes 
190 


Melville's  Arrow-Head— Pittsfield 


called  her — and  remained  a  whole  week.  This 
visit — certainly  unique  in  the  life  of  the  shy- 
Hawthorne — was  the  topic  when,  not  so  long 
agone,  we  last  looked  upon  the  living  face  of 
Melville  in  his  city  home.  March  weather 
prevented  walks  abroad,  so  the  pair  spent  most 
of  the  week  in  smoking  and  talking  metaphysics 
in  the  barn, — Hawthorne  usually  lounging  upon 
a  carpenter's  bench.  When  he  was  leaving,  he 
jocosely  declared  he  would  write  a  report  of 
their  psychological  discussions  for  publication 
in  a  volume  to  be  called  "  A  Week  on  a  Work- 
Bench  in  a  Barn,"  the  title  being  a  travesty  upon 
that  of  Thoreau's  then  recent  book,  "  A  Week 
on  Concord  River,"  etc. 

Sitting  upon  the  north  piazza,  of  "  Piazza 
Tales,"  at  Arrow-Head,  where  Hawthorne  and 
his  friend  lingered  in  summer  days,  we  look 
away  to  Graylock  and  enjoy  '*  the  calm  prospect 
of  things  from  a  fair  piazza"  which  Melville  so 
whimsically  describes.  At  Arrow-Head,  too, 
we  find  the  astonishing  chimney  which  suggested 
the  essay,  still  occupying  the  centre  of  the  house 
-  and  "  leaving  only  the  odd  holes  and  corners" 
to  Melville's  nieces,  who  now  inhabit  the  place 
in  summer ;  the  study  where  Hawthorne  and 
Melville  discussed  the  plot  of  the  "  White 
Whale"  and  other  tales ;  the  great  fireplace, 
191 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


with  its  inscriptions  from  "  I  and  my  Chim- 
ney the  window-view  of  Melville's  "  October 
Mountain," — beloved  of  Longfellow, — whose 
autumn  glories  inspired  that  superb  word-picture 
and  metaphysical  sketch. 

On  a  near  knoll,  commanding  a  view  of  the 
circle  of  mountains  and  the  winding  river,  stands 
the  sometime  summer  residence  of  Holmes 
among  his  ancestral  acres,  where  Hawthorne 
and  Fields  came  to  visit  him.  His  M  den,"  in 
which  he  did  much  literary  work,  overlooks  the 
beautiful  meadows,  and  is  now  expanded  into  a 
large  library,  while  the  trees  he  planted  are 
grown  to  be  the  crowning  beauty  of  the  place, 
which  the  owner  calls  Holmesdale.  It  was  the 
hereditary  home  of  the  Wendells. 

Beyond,  at  the  edge  of  the  town  of  Pittsfield, 
is  the  mansion  where  Longfellow  found  his  wife 
and  his  famous  "  Old  Clock  on  the  Stairs."  At 
the  Athenaeum  in  the  town  some  thousands  of 
Holmes's  books  will  soon  be  placed,  and  here  is 
preserved  the  secretary  from  Hawthorne's  study 
in  the  little  red  house, — a  time-worn  mahogany 
combination  of  desk,  drawers,  and  shelves,  at 
which  he  wrote  "  The  House  of  the  Seven 
Gables,"  "The  Wonder-Book,"  "The  Snow 
Image,"  and  part  of  "The  Blithedale  Ro- 
mance." Pittsfield  was  long  the  home  of 
192 


Hawthorne's  Habit  of  Meditation 


M  Godfrey  Graylock here  the  gifted  Rose 
Terry  Cooke  passed  her  closing  years  of  life 
with  her  husband,  and  not  far  away  Josh  Bil- 
lings, "the  Yankee  Solomon,"  was  born  and 
reared  as  Henry  Savage  Shaw.  One  day  we 
trace  from  Pittsfield  the  footsteps  of  Hawthorne 
and  Melville  across  the  Taconics  to  the  whilom 
home  of  "  Mother  Ann"  and  to  the  higher 
Hancock  peaks. 

Hawthorne's  daily  walk  to  the  post-office  was 
past  the  later  residence  of  Charlotte  Cushman, 
and  by  the  church  where  the  older  Channing 
delivered  his  last  discourse  and  where  twenty 
years  ago  Parkhurst  was  preacher.  In  the 
church-tower  Fanny  Kemble's  clock  still  tells 
the  hours  above  the  lovely  spot  where  she  de- 
sired to  be  buried. 

These  various  excursions  compass  the  range 
of  Hawthorne's  rambles  in  this  region :  he  was 
never  ten  miles  away  from  the  little  red  house 
during  his  residence  here.  Obviously  he  pre- 
ferred short  and  solitary  strolls  which  allowed 
undisturbed  meditation  upon  the  work  in  hand. 
The  quantity  and  finish  of  the  writing  done 
here  indicate  that  much  thought  was  expended 
upon  it  outside  his  study.  We  may  be  sure  that 
upon  "  The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables"  were 
bestowed,  besides  the  five  months  of  daily  sessions 
N  ,93 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


at  his  desk,  other  months  of  study  and  thought 
as  he  strolled  the  country  roads  and  loitered  by 
the  lake-side  or  in  the  dell  of  "  Blossom-Brook." 
He  avowed  himself  a  shameless  idler  in  warm 
weather,  declaring  he  was  "good  for  nothing 
in  a  literary  way  until  after  the  autumnal  frosts" 
brightened  his  imagination  as  they  did  the  foliage 
about  him  here ;  yet  the  meditations  of  one 
summer  in  Berkshire  produced  his  masterpiece, 
and  the  next  summer  accomplished  "  The  Won- 
der-Book," quickly  followed  by  "  The  Snow 
Image"  and  "  Blithedale."  During  this  summer 
also  he  had  a  voluminous  correspondence  with 
the  many  "  Pyncheon  jackasses"  who  thought 
themselves  aggrieved  by  his  use  of  their  name  in 
"  The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables." 

Of  the  simple  home-life  at  the  little  red 
house,  Hawthorne's  diaries  and  letters,  as  well 
as  some  of  the  books  written  here,  afford  pleasing 
glimpses.  The  "  Violet"  and  "  Peony"  of  the 
"  Snow  Image"  story  are  the  novelist's  own  lit- 
tle Una  and  Julian,  and  the  tale  was  suggested 
by  some  occurrence  in  their  play ;  the  incidents 
related  of  Eustace  Bright  and  the  young  Pringles, 
which  are  prefixed  to  the  u  Wonder-Book" 
stories,  are  merely  experiences  of  Hawthorne 
and  his  children,  and  during  the  composition 
of  these  tales  he  delighted  these  children — as 
194 


Life  in  the  Little  Red  House 


one  of  them  remembers — by  reading  to  them 
each  evening  the  work  of  the  day.  A  grim- 
visaged  negress  named  Peters,  who  was  the 
servant  here  in  the  little  red  house,  is  said  to 
have  suggested  the  character  of  Aunt  Keziah 
in  "  Septimius  Felton." 

Hawthorne's  chickens  receive  notice  as  mem- 
bers of  the  family  in  his  diary, — thus  :  "  Seven 
chickens  hatched,  J.  T.  Headley  called — eight 
chickens ;"  "  ascended  a  mountain  with  my 
wife,  eight  more  chickens  hatched."  In  a  let- 
ter to  Horatio  Bridge,  "  Our  children  grow 
apace  and  so  do  our  chickens "  we  are  so 
intimate  with  every  individual  chicken  that  it 
seems  like  cannibalism  to  think  of  eating  one 
of  them."  Hawthorne's  daily  walk  with  pail 
in  hand  to  Luther  Butler's,  the  next  farm-house, 
he  speaks  of  as  his  r*  milky  way."  Butler  lives 
now  two  miles  distant.  The  novelist  thus  an- 
nounces to  his  friend  Bridge  the  birth  of  the 
present  gifted  poetess,  Mrs.  Lathrop,  the  daugh- 
ter of  his  age  :  "  Mrs.  Hawthorne  has  published 
a  little  work  which  still  lies  in  sheets,  but  makes 
some  noise  in  the  world  ;  it  is  a  healthy  miss 
with  no  present  pretensions  to  beauty."  Five 
cats  were  cherished  by  the  novelist  and  his 
children ;  a  snowy  morning  after  Hawthorne's 
removal,  three  of  the  cats  came  to  a  neighbor- 
i95 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


ing  house,  where  their  descendants  are  still 
petted  and  cherished. 

A  few  visitors  came  to  the  little  red  house — 
Kemble,  James,  Lowell,  Holmes,  E.  P.  Whip- 
ple, and  the  others  already  mentioned — in  whose 
presence  the  "  statue  of  night  and  silence"  was 
wont  to  relax,  but  for  the  most  part  his  life  was 
that  of  a  recluse.  Here,  as  elsewhere,  his 
thoughts  dwelt  apart  in  "  a  twilight  region" 
where  the  company  of  his  kind  was  usually  a 
perturbing  intrusion.  For  companionship,  his 
family,  the  lake,  the  woods,  his  own  thoughts, 
sufficed ;  he  seldom  sought  any  other,  and  there- 
fore was  unpopular  in  the  neighborhood.  It  is 
hardly  to  be  supposed  that  the  creator  of  Zeno- 
bia,  Hester  Prynne,  and  the  Pyncheons  would 
greatly  enjoy  the  society  of  his  rural  neighbors, 
but  they  were  not  therefore  the  less  displeased 
by  his  habitually  going  out  of  his  way — some- 
times across  the  fields — to  avoid  meeting  them. 
Some  of  them  had  a  notion  that  he  was  the 
author  of  "  a  poem,  or  an  arithmetic,  or  some 
other  kind  of  a  book," — as  he  makes  "  Prim- 
rose Pringle"  to  say  of  him  in  the  tale, — but 
to  most  he  was  incomprehensible,  perhaps  a 
little  uncanny,  and  the  great  genius  of  romance 
is  yet  mentioned  here  as  "  a  queer  sort  o'  man 
that  lived  in  Tappan's  red  house." 

196 


Reasons  for  leaving  Berkshire 


His  son  records  that  after  Hawthorne  had 
freed  himself  from  Salem  "  he  soon  wearied 
of  any  particular  locality after  a  time  he 
tired  even  of  beautiful  Berkshire.  Its  obtrusive 
scenery  "  with  the  same  strong  impressions  re- 
peated day  after  day"  became  irksome ;  then  he 
grew  tired  of  the  mountains  and  "would  joy- 
fully see  them  laid  flat."  He  writes  to  Fields, 
"  I  am  sick  of  Berkshire,  and  hate  to  think  of 
spending  another  winter  here."  Doubtless  the 
region  which  we  behold  in  the  glamour  of  the 
early  autumn  seemed  very  different  to  Haw- 
thorne in  the  season  when  he  had  daily  "  to 
trudge  two  miles  to  the  post-office  through  snow 
or  slush  knee-deep."  Ellery  Channing — who 
had  knowledge  of  the  winter  here — in  his 
letters  to  Hawthorne  calls  Berkshire  u  that  Sa- 
tanic institution  of  Spitsbergen,"  "  that  ice- 
plant  of  the  Sedgwicks." 

A  more  cogent  reason  for  Hawthorne's  discon- 
tent here  is  found  in  his  failing  health.  He  writes 
to  Pike,  "  I  am  not  vigorous  as  I  used  to  be  on  the 
coast ;"  to  Fields,  "  For  the  first  time  since  boy- 
hood I  feel  languid  and  dispirited.  Oh, that  Provi- 
dence would  build  me  the  merest  shanty  and  mark 
me  out  a  rood  or  two  of  garden  near  the  coast." 

For  these  and  other  reasons  Hawthorne  finally 
left  Berkshire  at  the  end  of  1 85 1,  going  first  to 
197 


In  Berkshire  with  Hawthorne 


West  Newton  and  a  few  months  later  to  "  the 
Wayside,"  while  his  friend  Tappan  occupied 
the  thenceforth  famous  little  red  house. 

The  world  of  readers  owes  much  to  Haw- 
thorne's residence  among  the  mountains.  Be- 
sides the  material  here  gathered  and  the  ex- 
quisite settings  for  his  tales  these  landscapes 
afforded,  we  are  indebted  to  his  environment  in 
Berkshire  for  the  quality  of  the  work  here  ac- 
complished and  for  its  quantity  as  well ;  for  he 
responded  so  readily  to  the  inspiriting  influence 
of  his  surroundings  that  he  produced  more 
during  his  stay  here  than  at  any  similar  period 
of  his  life.  The  soulful  beauty  and  the  seclu- 
sion of  the  haunts  to  which  we  here  trace  him, 
suiting  well  his  solitary  mood,  may  measurably 
account  to  us  for  his  habit  of  thought  and  for 
the  manner  of  expression  by  which  nature  was 
here  portrayed  and  life  expounded  by  the  great 
master  of  American  romance. 


198 


DAY  WITH  THE  GOOD 
GRAY  POET 


A  DAY  WITH  THE  GOOD 
GRAY  POET 


Walk  and  Talk  with  Socrates  in  Camden  -  The  Bard?  s  Ap- 
pearance and  Surroundings  —  Recollections  of  his  Life  and 
W ork  —  Hospital  Service  —  Praise  for  his  Critics  —  His 
Literary  Habit ,  Purpose,  Equipment ,  and  Style  -  His 
Religious  Bent  -  Readings. 

"  T_TOW  can  you  find  him?  Nothing  is 
easier,"  quoth  the  Philadelphia  friend 
who  some  time  before  Whitman's  death  brought 
us  an  invitation  from  the  bard ;  "  you  have  only 
to  cross  the  ferry  and  apply  to  the  first  man  or 
woman  you  meet,  for  there  is  no  one  in  Cam- 
den who  does  not  know  Walt  Whitman  or  who 
would  not  go  out  of  his  way  to  bring  you  to 
him."  The  event  justifies  the  prediction,  for 
when  we  make  inquiry  of  a  tradesman  standing 
before  a  shop,  he  speedily  throws  aside  his  apron, 
closes  his  door  against  evidently  needed  custom- 
ers, and — despite  our  protest — sets  out  to  con- 
duct us  to  the  home  of  the  poet.  This  is  done 
with  such  obvious  ardor  that  we  hint  to  our  guide 
that  he  must  be  one  of  the  "  Whitmaniacs," 
whereupon  he  rejoins,  "  I  never  read  a  word 
Whitman  wrote.  I  don't  know  why  they  call 
him  Socrates,  but  I  do  know  he  never  passes  me 

201 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


without  a  friendly  nod  and  a  word  of  greeting 
that  warms  me  all  through."  We  subsequently 
find  that  it  is  this  sort  of  "  Whitmania,"  rather 
than  that  Swinburne  deplores,  which  pervades 
the  vicinage  of  the  poet's  home. 

Our  conductor  leaves  us  at  the  door  of  three 
hundred  and  twenty-eight  Mickle  Street,  a  neat 
thoroughfare  bordered  by  unpretentious  frame 
dwellings,  hardly  a  furlong  from  the  Delaware. 
The  dingy  little  two-storied  domicile  is  so  disap- 
pointingly different  from  what  we  were  expecting 
to  see  that  the  confirmatory  testimony  of  the  name 
"  W.  Whitman"  upon  the  door-plate  is  needed 
to  convince  us  that  this  is  the  oft-mentioned 
"  neat  and  comfortable"  dwelling  of  one  of  the 
world's  celebrities. 

We  are  kept  waiting  upon  the  door-step  long 
enough  to  observe  that  the  unpainted  boards  of 
the  house  are  weather-worn  and  that  the  shabby 
window-shutters  and  the  cellar-door,  which 
opens  aslant  upon  the  sidewalk,  are  in  sad  need 
of  repair,  and  then  we  are  admitted  by  the 
"  good,  faithful,  young  Jersey  woman  who,"  as 
he  lovingly  testifies,  "  cooks  for  and  vigilantly 
sees  to"  the  venerable  bard.  A  moment  later 
we  are  in  his  presence,  in  the  spacious  second- 
story  room  which  is  his  sleeping  apartment  and 
work-room. 

202 


Whitman's  Personal  Appearance 


"  You  are  good  to  come  early  while  I  am 
fresh  and  rested,"  exclaims  Walt  Whitman, 
rising  to  his  six  feet  of  burly  manhood  and 
advancing  a  heavy  step  or  two  to  greet  us ;  "  we 
are  going  to  have  a  talk,  and  we  have  something 
to  talk  about,  you  know,"  referring  to  a  literary 
venture  of  ours  which  had  procured  us  the  in- 
vitation to  visit  him.  When  he  has  regained 
the  depths  of  his  famous  and  phenomenal  chair, 
the  "  Jersey  woman"  hands  him  a  score  of  let- 
ters, which  he  offers  to  lay  aside,  but  we  insist 
that  he  shall  read  them  at  once,  and  while  he  is 
thus  occupied  we  have  opportunity  to  observe 
more  closely  the  bard  and  his  surroundings. 

We  see  a  man  made  in  massive  mould,  stal- 
wart and  symmetrical, — not  bowed  by  the  weight 
of  time  nor  deformed  by  the  long  years  of  hemi- 
plegia ;  a  majestic  head,  large,  leonine,  Homeric, 
crowned  with  a  wealth  of  flowing  silvery  hair ; 
a  face  like  "  the  statued  Greek"  (Bucke  says  it 
is  the  noblest  he  ever  saw) ;  all  the  features  are 
full  and  handsome;  the  forehead,  high  and 
thoughtful,  is  marked  by  "  deep  furrows  which 
life  has  ploughed the  heavy  brows  are  highly 
arched  above  eyes  of  gray-blue  which  in  repose 
seem  suave  rather  than  brilliant ;  the  upper  lid 
droops  over  the  eye  nearly  to  the  pupil, — a  con- 
dition which  obtains  in  partial  ptosis, — and  we 
203 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


afterward  observe  that  when  he  speaks  of  mat- 
ters which  deeply  move  him  his  eyelids  have  a 
tendency  to  decline  still  farther,  imparting  to 
his  eyes  an  appearance  of  lethargy  altogether  at 
variance  with  the  thrilling  earnestness  and  tre- 
mor of  his  voice.  A  strong  nose,  cheeks  round 
and  delicate,  a  complexion  of  florid  and  trans- 
parent pink, — its  hue  being  heightened  by  the 
snowy  whiteness  of  the  fleecy  beard  which 
frames  the  face  and  falls  upon  the  breast.  The 
face  is  sweet  and  wholesome  rather  than  refined, 
vital  and  virile  rather  than  intellectual.  Joa- 
quin Miller  has  said  that,  even  when  destitute 
and  dying,  Whitman  "  looked  like  a  Titan 
god." 

We  think  the  habitual  expression  of  his  face 
to  be  that  of  the  sage  benignity  that  comes  with 
age  when  life  has  been  well  lived  and  life's  work 
well  done.  The  expression  bespeaks  a  soul  at 
ease  with  itself,  unbroken  by  age,  poverty,  and 
disease,  unsoured  by  calumny  and  insult.  Cer- 
tainly his  bufferings  and  his  brave  endurance  of 
wrong  have  left  no  record  of  malice  or  even  of 
impatience  upon  his  kindly  face.  His  manly 
form  is  clad  in  a  loosely  fitting  suit  of  gray ;  his 
rolling  and  ample  shirt-collar,  worn  without  a 
tie,  is  open  at  the  throat  and  exposes  the  upper 
part  of  his  breast ;  all  his  attire,  "  from  snowy 
204 


His  Study  and  Surroundings 


linen  to  burnished  boot,"  is  scrupulously  clean 
and  neat. 

His  room  is  of  generous  proportions,  occupy- 
ing nearly  the  entire  width  of  the  house,  and 
lighted  by  three  windows  in  front.  The  floor 
is  partly  uncarpeted,  and  the  furniture  is  of 
the  simplest ;  his  bed,  covered  by  a  white  coun- 
terpane, occupies  a  corner ;  there  are  two  large 
tables ;  an  immense  iron-bound  trunk  stands  by 
one  wall  and  an  old-fashioned  stove  by  another ; 
a  number  of  boxes  and  uncushioned  seats  are 
scattered  through  the  apartment ;  on  the  walls 
are  wardrobe-hooks,  shelves,  and  many  pictures, 
— a  few  fine  engravings,  a  print  of  the  Seminole 
Osceola,  portraits  of  the  poet's  parents  (his 
father's  face  is  a  good  one)  and  sisters,  and  of 
"  another — not  a  sister." 

There  are  many  books  here  and  there,  some 
of  them  well  worn ;  one  corner  holds  several 
Greek  and  Latin  classics  and  copies  of  Burns, 
Tennyson,  Scott,  Ossian,  Emerson,  etc.  On 
the  large  table  near  his  chair  are  his  writing 
materials,  with  the  Bible,  Shakespeare,  Dante, 
and  the  Iliad  within  reach.  Bundles  of  papers 
lie  in  odd  places  about  the  room  ;  piles  of  books, 
magazines,  and  manuscripts  are  heaped  high 
upon  the  tables,  litter  the  chairs,  and  overflow 
and  encumber  the  floor.  This  room  holds 
205 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


what  Whitman  has  called  the  "  storage  collec- 
tion" of  his  life. 

"  And  now  you  are  to  tell  me  about  yourself 
and  your  work,"  says  the  poet,  pushing  aside 
his  letters.  But,  although  he  is  the  best  of  lis- 
teners, we  are  intent  to  make  him  talk,  and  a 
fortunate  remark  concerning  one  of  his  letters 
which  had  seemed  to  interest  him  more  than 
the  others — it  came  from  a  friend  of  his  far-away 
boyhood — enables  us  to  profit  by  the  reminis- 
cential  mood  the  letter  has  inspired. 

In  his  low-toned  voice  he  pictures  his  early 
home,  his  parents,  and  his  first  ventures  into  the 
world ;  with  evident  relish  he  narrates  his  ludi- 
crous experience  when  he — a  stripling  school- 
master— "went  boarding  'round."  Than  this, 
there  was  but  one  happier  period  of  his  life, 
and  that  was  when  he  drove  among  the  farms 
and  villages  distributing  his  Long  Islander: 
"  that  was  bliss." 

Later  he  was  a  politician  and  "  stumped  the 
island"  for  the  Democratic  candidates,  but  the 
enactment  of  the  fugitive  slave  law  disgusted 
him,  and  he  declared  his  political  emancipation 
in  the  poem  "  Blood-Money."  At  odd  times 
he  has  done  "  a  deal  of  newspaper  drudgery" 
and  other  work,  but  his  "  forte  always  was  loaf- 
ing and  writing  poetry, — at  least  until  the  war." 
206 


His  Recollections 


He  began  early  to  clothe  his  thought  in  verse,  and 
was  but  a  lad  when  a  poem  of  his  was  accepted 
for  publication  in  the  New  York  Mirror,  and  he 
depicts  for  us  the  surprised  delight  with  which 
he  beheld  his  stanzas  in  that  fashionable  journal. 

A  pleasure  of  those  early  years  was  the  com- 
panionship of  Bryant,  and  he  details  to  us  the 
"glorious  walks  and  talks"  they  had  together 
along  the  North  Shore  in  sweet  summer  days. 
This,  he  says  with  a  sigh,  was  the  dearest  of 
the  friendships  lost  to  him  by  the  publication  of 
**  Leaves  of  Grass but  there  were  compen- 
sations, Emerson  and  Tennyson."  Of  later 
events  he  speaks  less  freely.  Of  the  years  of 
devoted  service  to  the  wounded  and  dying  in 
army  hospitals,  when  day  and  night  he  liter- 
ally gave  himself  for  others, — living  upon  the 
coarsest  fare  that  he  might  bestow  his  earnings 
upon  "  his  sick  boys," — of  these  years  he  speaks 
not  at  all,  save  as  to  the  causation  of  his  "  war 
paralysis."  "  Yes,  it  made  an  old  man  of  me ; 
but  I  would  like  to  do  it  all  again  if  there  were 
need."  Of  his  long  years  of  suffering  and  his 
brave  and  patient  confronting  of  pain,  poverty, 
and  imminent  death,  his  94  Specimen  Days"  is 
the  fitting  record. 

Replying  to  a  question  concerning  a  dainty 
volume  of  his  poems  which  lay  near  us,  and 
207 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


which  we  have  been  secretly  coveting,  he  says, 
"  You  know  I  have  never  been  the  fashion ; 
publishers  were  afraid  of  me,  and  I  have  sold 
the  books  myself,  though  I  always  advise  people 
not  to  buy  them,  for  I  fear  they  are  worthless." 
But  when  he  writes  his  name  and  ours  upon  the 
title-page,  and  lays  within  the  cover  several  por- 
traits taken  at  different  periods  of  his  life,  we 
wonder  if  he  can  ever  know  how  very  far  from 
"  worthless"  the  book  will  be  to  us.  We  tender 
in  payment  a  bank-note  of  larger  denomination 
than  we  could  be  supposed  to  possess,  with  a 
deprecating  remark  upon  the  novelty  of  an 
author's  handling  a  fifty-dollar  note,  whereupon 
he  laughs  heartily  :  "  A  novelty  to  you,  is  it  ? 
I  tell  you  it's  an  impossibility  to  me ;  why,  my 
whole  income  from  my  books  during  a  recent 
half-year  was  only  twenty-two  dollars  and  six 
cents :  don't  forget  the  six  cents,"  he  adds, 
with  a  twinkle.  Then  he  assures  us  that  he  is 
not  in  want,  and  that  his  "  shanty,"  as  he  calls 
his  home,  is  nearly  paid  for. 

He  proposes  a  walk, — "a  hobble"  it  must 
be  for  him, — which  may  afford  opportunity  to 
change  the  note ;  and  as  we  saunter  toward  the 
river,  he  leaning  heavily  upon  his  cane,  it  is  a 
pleasure  to  observe  the  evident  feeling  of  liking 
and  camaraderie  which  people  have  for  him. 
208 


Popularity  with  his  Neighbors 


They  go  out  of  their  way  to  meet  him  and  to 
receive  merely  a  friendly  nod,  for  he  stops  to 
speak  with  none  save  the  children  who  leave 
their  play  to  run  to  him.  He  seems  mightily 
amused  when  one  wee  toddler  calls  him  "  Mister 
Socrates,"  and  he  tells  us  this  is  the  first  time  he 
has  been  so  addressed,  although  he  understands 
that  some  of  his  friends  speak  of  him  among 
themselves  by  the  name  of  that  philosopher. 
So  far  as  he  knows,  the  name  was  first  applied 
to  him  in  Buchanan's  lines  "  To  Socrates  in 
Camden." 

Everywhere  we  go,  on  the  ferry,  at  the  hotel 
where  we  lunch,  he  receives  affectionate  greet- 
ing from  people  of  every  rank,  yet  he  is  not 
loquacious,  certainly  not  effusive.  He  shakes 
hands  but  once  while  we  are  out,  and  that  is 
with  an  unknown  man,  and  because  he  is  un- 
known, as  Whitman  afterward  tells  us. 

During  luncheon  we  speak  of  a  recent  visit  to 
Mrs.  Howarth  (the  poetess  "  Clementine"). 
Whitman  is  at  once  interested,  and  questions 
until  he  has  drawn  out  the  pathetic  story  of  her 
struggles  with  poverty,  disease,  and  impeding 
environment,  and  then  declares  he  will  go  to 
see  her  as  soon  as  he  is  able.  He  declines  to 
receive  a  copy  of  her  poems,  saying  he  is  far 
more  interested  in  her  than  he  could  possibly 
o  209 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


be  in  her  books,  and  that  he  "  nowadays  re- 
ligiously abstains  from  reading  poetry."  Con- 
firmation of  this  latter  statement  occurs  in  our 
subsequent  conversation.  A  friend  of  ours  had 
met  Swinburne,  and  had  been  assured  by  that 
erratic  (please  don't  print  it  erotic)  bard  that 
he  thinks  Whitman,  next  to  Hugo,  the  best  of 
recent  poets.  When  we  tell  our  poet  of  this, 
and  endeavor  to  ascertain  if  the  admiration  be 
reciprocal,  we  find  him  unfamiliar  with  Swin- 
burne's recent  works.  Reference  to  the  latter's 
retraction  of  his  first  praise  elicits  the  pertinent 
observation,  "  The  trouble  with  Swinburne 
seems  to  be  he  don't  know  his  own  mind," 
but  this  is  followed  by  warm  encomiums  upon 
"  Atalanta"  and  its  gifted  author. 

Whitman  had  seen  Emerson  for  the  last  time 
when  the  philosopher's  memory  had  failed  and 
all  his  powers  were  weakening  :  instead  of  being 
shocked  by  this  condition,  Whitman  thinks  it 
fit  and  natural,  "  nature  gradually  reclaiming  the 
elements  she  had  lent,  work  all  nobly  done,  soul 
and  senses  preparing  for  rest."  Mentioning 
George  Arnold, — 

"  Doubly  dead  because  he  died  so  young," — 

we  find  that  Whitman  loved  and  mourned  him 
tenderly.    He  expresses  an  especial  pleasure 
210 


His  Good  Word  for  Everybody 


and  pride  in  the  successes  of  the  poet  Richard 
Watson  Gilder, — *'  young  Gilder,"  as  he  famil- 
iarly calls  him.  He  loves  Browning,  and  laments 
that  "  Browning  never  took  to"  him.  He  thinks 
our  own  country  is  fortunate  in  having  felt  the 
clean  and  healthful  influences  of  four  such  natures 
as  Emerson,  Bryant,  Whittier,  and  Longfellow. 

Indeed,  he  has  a  good  word  for  everybody, 
and  discerns  laudable  qualities  in  some  whom 
the  world  has  agreed  to  contemn  and  cast  out. 
He  has  glowing  expressions  of  affection  for  his 
devoted  friends  in  all  lands,  and  only  words  of 
excuse  for  his  enemies.  Of  the  pharisaic  Har- 
lan, who  dismissed  him  from  a  government 
clerkship  solely  because  he  had,  ten  years  be- 
fore, published  the  poems  of  "  Enfans  d'Adam," 
he  charitably  says,  "  No  doubt  the  man  thought 
he  was  doing  right."  Concerning  his  harshest 
critics,  including  the  author  of  the  choice  epithet 
"  swan  of  the  sewers,"  he  speaks  only  in  justi- 
fication :  from  their  stand-point,  their  denuncia- 
tions of  him  and  his  book  were  deserved ;  "  he 
never  dreamt  of  blaming  them  for  not  seeing  as 
he  sees." 

After  our  return  to  his  "  shanty"  we  read  to 
him  a  laudatory  notice  from  the  current  number 
of  one  of  our  great  magazines,  in  which  one  of 
his  poems  is  mentioned  with  especial  favor ; 
211 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


whereupon  he  produces  from  his  trunk  a  note 
written  some  years  before  from  the  same  maga- 
zine, contemptuously  refusing  to  publish  that 
very  poem.  Evidences  like  this  of  a  change  in 
popular  opinion  are  not  needed  to  confirm  Whit- 
man's faith  in  his  own  future,  nor  in  that  of  the 
great  humanity  of  which  he  is  the  prophet  and 
exponent. 

Questioned  concerning  his  habits  and  methods 
of  literary  work,  he  says  he  carries  some  sheets 
of  paper  loosely  fastened  together  and  pencils 
upon  these  "  the  rough  draft  of  his  thought" 
wherever  the  thought  comes  to  him.  Thus, 
"  Leaves  of  Grass"  was  composed  on  the  Brook- 
lyn ferry,  on  the  top  of  stages  amid  the  roar  of 
Broadway,  at  the  opera,  in  the  fields,  on  the 
sea-shore.  "  Drum  Taps"  was  written  amid 
war  scenes,  on  battle-fields,  in  camps,  at  hospital 
bedsides,  in  actual  contact  with  the  subjects  it 
portrays  with  such  tenderness  and  power.  The 
poems  thus  born  of  spontaneous  impulse  are 
finally  given  to  the  world  in  a  crisp  diction 
which  is  the  result  of  much  study  and  thought ; 
every  word  is  well  considered, — the  work  of 
revision  being  done  "almost  anywhere"  and 
without  the  ordinary  aids  to  literary  composi- 
tion. In  late  years  he  wrote  mostly  upon  the 
broad  right  arm  of  his  chair. 

2,12 


His  Literary  Work — Its  Aims 


Complete  equipment  for  his  work  was  de- 
rived from  contact  with  Nature  in  her  abound- 
ing moods,  from  sympathetic  intimacy  with  men 
and  women  in  all  phases  of  their  lives,  and  from 
life-long  study  of  the  best  books ;  these — Job, 
Isaiah,  Homer,  Dante,  Shakespeare — have  been 
his  teachers,  and  possibly  his  models,  although 
he  has  never  consciously  imitated  any  of  them. 
His  matter  and  manner  are  alike  his  own ;  he 
has  not  borrowed  Blake's  style,  as  Stedman  be- 
lieved, to  recast  Emerson's  thoughts,  as  Clarence 
Cook  alleged.  His  style  would  naturally  re- 
semble that  of  the  Semitic  prophets  and  Gaelic 
bards, — "  the  large  utterance  of  the  early  gods," 
— because  inspired  by  familiarity  with  the  same 
objects :  the  surging  sea,  the  wind-swept  moun- 
tain, the  star-decked  heaven,  the  forest  pri- 
meval. 

His  purpose,  the  moral  elevation  of  humanity, 
he  trusts  is  apparent  in  every  page  of  his  book. 
By  his  book  he  means  "  Leaves  of  Grass,"  the 
real  work  of  his  life,  representing  the  truest 
thoughts  and  the  highest  imaginings  of  forty 
years,  to  which  his  other  work  has  been  inci- 
dental and  tributary.  After  its  eight  periods  of 
growth,  "  hitches,"  he  calls  them,  he  completes 
them  with  the  annex,  "  Good-bye  my  Fancy," 
and  thinks  his  record  for  the  future  is  made  up  ; 
21 3 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


"  hit  or  miss,  he  will  bother  himself  no  more 
about  it." 

When  questioned  concerning  the  lines  whose 
"  naked  naturalness"  has  been  an  offence  to 
many,  he  impressively  avers  that  he  has  pon- 
dered them  earnestly  in  these  latest  days,  and  is 
sure  he  would  not  alter  or  recall  them  if  he 
could. 

While  not  professing  a  moral  regeneration  or 
confessing  the  need  of  it,  he  yet  assures  us, 
"  No  array  of  words  can  describe  how  much  I 
am  at  peace  about  God  and  about  death."  The 
author  of  "  Whispers  of  Heavenly  Death"  can- 
not be  an  irreverent  person ;  the  impassioned 
"  prayer" — 

"  That  Thou,  O  God,  my  life  hast  lighted 

With  ray  of  light,  ineffable,  vouchsafed  of  Thee. 

For  that,  O  God,  be  it  my  latest  word,  here  on  my  knees, 

Old,  poor,  and  paralyzed,  I  thank  Thee.  .  .  . 

I  will  cling  to  Thee,  O  God,  though  the  waves  buffet  me. 

Thee,  Thee,  at  least,  I  know*' — 

is  not  the  utterance  of  an  irreligious  heart. 
One  who  has  known  Whitman  long  and  well 
testifies  that  he  was  always  a  religious  exalte, 
and  his  stanzas  show  that  his  musings  on  death 
and  immortality  are  inspired  by  fullest  faith. 
As  we  listen  to  him,  calmly  discoursing  upon 
214 


His  Religious  Trust — Readings 


the  great  mysteries, — which  to  him  are  now 
mysteries  no  longer, — we  wonder  how  many  of 
those  who  call  him  "  beast"  or  "  atheist"  can 
confront  the  vast  unknown  with  his  lofty  trust, 
to  say  nothing  of  actual  thanksgiving  for  death 
itself! 

11  Praised  be  the  fathomless  universe 
For  life  and  joy,  for  objects  and  knowledge  curious, 
And  for  love,  sweet  love, — but  praise  !  praise  !  praise  ! 
For  the  sure-enwinding  arms  of  cool-enfolding  death.'* 

We  who  survive  him  will  not  forget  his  peace- 
ful yielding  of  himself  to  "  the  sure-enwinding 
arms,"  nor  the  abounding  trust  breathed  in  his 
last  message,  sent  back  from  the  mystic  frontier 
of  the  shadowy  realm :  "  Tell  them  it  makes  no 
difference  whether  I  live  or  die." 

In  our  chat  he  discloses  a  surprising  knowl- 
edge of  men  and  things,  and  a  more  surprising 
lack  of  knowledge  of  his  own  poetry.  More 
than  once  it  strangely  appears  that  the  visitor  is 
more  familiar  with  the  lines  under  discussion 
than  is  their  author.  When  this  is  commented 
upon  he  laughingly  says,  "  Oh,  yes,  my  friends 
often  tell  me  there  is  a  book  called  '  Leaves  of 
Grass*  which  I  ought  to  read."  So  when  we, 
about  to  take  leave,  ask  him  to  recite  one  of  his 
shorter  poems,  he  assures  us  he  does  not  remem- 

21$ 


A  Day  with  the  Good  Gray  Poet 


ber  one  of  them,  but  will  read  anything  we 
wish.  We  ask  for  the  wonderful  elegy,  "  Out 
of  the  Cradle  endlessly  Rocking,"  and  afterward 
for  the  night  hymn,  "  When  Lilacs  Last  in  the 
Dooryard  Bloomed,"  and  his  compliance  con- 
fers a  never-to-be-forgotten  pleasure.  He  reads 
slowly  and  without  effort,  his  voice  often  tremu- 
lous with  emotion,  the  lines  gaining  new  gran- 
deur and  pathos  as  they  come  from  his  lips. 

And  this — alas  that  it  must  be ! — is  our  final 
recollection  of  one  of  the  world's  immortals : 
a  hoar  and  reverend  bard, — "  old,  poor,  and 
paralyzed,"  yet  clinging  to  the  optimistic  creeds 
of  his  youth, — throned  in  his  great  chair  among 
his  books,  with  the  waning  light  falling  like  a 
benediction  upon  his  uplifted  head,  his  face  and 
eyes  suffused  with  the  exquisite  tenderness  of 
his  theme,  and  all  the  air  about  him  vibrating 
with  the  tones  of  his  immortal  chant  to  Death, 
— the  "  dark  mother  always  gliding  near  with 
soft  feet." 

Another  hand-clasp,  a  prayerful  "  God  keep 
you,"  and  we  have  left  him  alone  in  the  gather- 
ing twilight. 

We  will  not  here  discuss  his  literary  merits. 
The  encomiums  of  Emerson,  Thoreau,  Bur- 
roughs, Sanborn,  Stedman,  Ruskin,  Tennyson, 
Rossetti,  Buchanan,  Sarrazin,  etc.,  show  what 
216 


His  Future  Fame 


he  is  to  men  of  their  intellectual  stature  ;  but 
will  he  ever  reach  the  great,  struggling  mass  for 
whose  uplifting  he  wrought  ?  His  own  brave 
faith  is  contagious,  and  we  may  discern  in  the 
wide-spread  sorrow  over  his  death,  in  the  changed 
attitude  of  critics  and  reviewers,  as  well  as  in 
the  largely  increased  demand  for  his  books,  evi- 
dences of  his  general  acceptance. 

His  day  is  coming, — is  come.  He  died  with 
its  dawn  shining  full  upon  him. 


217 


INDEX 


Abbot,  C.  C,  104. 
Agassiz,  49,  104,  115. 

Alcott,  Bronson,  21,  73,  78,  92,  144}   Orchard  House, 

54  j  Wayside,  58. 
Alcott,  L.  M.,  21,  54,  102  j  Grave,  78}  Homes,  21,  55. 
Aldrich,  91,  ill,  140;  In  Boston,  92}  Ponkapog,  146. 
Amesbury,  124. 
Auburndale,  146. 
Austin,  J.  G.,  102. 
Bartlett,  G.  B.,  25,  34,  41. 
Bartol,  Dr.,  48,  94. 
Beecher,  H.  W.,  176,  185. 
Benson,  Carl,  184. 
Berkshire,  155-198. 
Billings,  Josh,  193. 
Boston,  83-102. 
Bridge,  Horatio,  34,  182. 
Brook  Farm,  147, 
Brown,  John,  20,  23. 
Bryant,  W.  C,  174,  188,  189,  207. 
Burritt,  Elihu,  176. 
Cambridge,  103. 
Carter,  Robert,  109. 

Channing,  W.  E.,  24,  41,  50,  72,  186  j  Homes,  22,  24, 

Clarke,  J.  F.,  27,  76. 

Clough,  Arthur,  49,  104,  118. 

Concord,  17-805  Battle-Field,  43  ;  River,  39. 

Conway,  Moncure,  quoted,  29,  48. 

Cooke,  Rose  Terry,  193. 

219 


Index 


Corner  Book-Store,  Boston,  87. 
Curtis,  G.  W.,  33,  48,  148,  149. 
Cushman,  Charlotte,  114,  193. 
Dana,  C.  A.,  149. 
Dana,  R.  H.,  105. 
Danvers,  Oak-Knoll,  138. 
Day  with  Walt  Whitman,  201. 
Deerfield  Arch,  173. 
Deland,  Margaret,  93. 
Elmwood,  110. 

Emerson,  R.  W.,  26,  27,  28,  36,  41,  43,  69,  86,  144, 

175  j  Grave,  77  ;  Home,  45. 
Emerson,  William,  26,  29,  35. 
Ethan  Brand,  166. 
Fanny  Fern's  Grave,  115. 
Felton,  Professor,  104. 
Field,  H.  M.,  190. 
Fields,  Annie,  89,  91. 
Fields,  J.  T.,  65,  87;  Home,  89. 

Fuller,  Margaret,  48,  53,  86,  115,  1495  Brattle  House, 
105. 

Gail  Hamilton,  66,  139. 

Garrison,  W.  L.,  85,  102,  139. 

Gilder,  R.  W.,  211. 

Gladden,  Washington,  164. 

Grant,  Robert,  89,  99. 

Gray,  Asa,  105. 

Graylock,  158,  167,  174,  184. 

Guiney,  L.  I.,  99,  102  j  Home,  146. 

Hale,  E.  E.,  945  Study  and  Abode,  100. 

Hale,  Lucretia  P.,  99. 

Hamilton,  Gail,  66,  139. 

Harris,  Professor,  56. 

220 


Index 


Haverhill,  122. 

Hawthorne,  27,  41,  50,  53,  85,  88,  91 ;  Berkshire,  155- 
198  j  Brook  Farm,  149  ;  Manse,  28-39  5  Salem,  128— 
138;  Sleepy  Hollow,  75-77  j  Wayside,  59-67. 

Headley,  J.  T.,  187,  195. 

Higginson,  T.  W.,  94,  99,  104. 

Hilliard,  George,  34,  66,  91. 

Hoar,  Elizabeth,  25. 

Hoar,  Judge,  27. 

Holmes,  84;  Boston  Abodes,  91,  955  Cambridge,  1035 

Grave,  114;  Pittsfield,  192. 
House  of  the  Seven  Gables,  132,  193,  194. 
Howarth,  Clementine,  209. 
Howe,  fulia  W.,  98. 
Howells,  49,  66;  Homes,  97,  105,  117. 
Jamaica  Plain,  145. 
Jewett,  Sarah  Orne,  91. 
Kemble,  Fanny,  169,  186,  188,  193. 
Kossuth,  Louis,  49,  187. 
Larcom,  Lucy,  139. 
Lathrop,  G.  P.,  59. 
Lathrop,  Rose  H.,  195. 
Laurel  Lake,  185. 
Lenox  (Hawthorne),  176-198. 
Little  Men,  21. 
Little  Women,  21,  55,  78. 

Longfellow,  106,110,  139,  192;    Grave,  114;  Home, 

107;  Wayside  Inn,  118. 
Lowell,  J.  R.,  43,  118  ;  Elmwood,  110;  Mount  Auburn, 

113. 

Marshfield,  142. 
Martineau,  Harriet,  85,  106. 

Melville,  Herman,  177,  185,  188;  Arrow-Head,  190. 
221 


Index 


Monument  Mountain,  168,  179,  187. 

Moulton,  L.  C,  93,  98. 

Mount  Auburn,  113. 

Natural  Bridge,  169. 

North  Adams,  158-171. 

Norton,  Professor,  104. 

Oak-Knoll,  138. 

Old  Manse,  28-39. 

Orchard  House,  53-56. 

Parker,  Theodore,  49,  85. 

Parkman,  Francis,  94,  113;  Home,  145. 

Parsons,  T.  W.,  118,  119,  120. 

Par  ton,  James,  1 15  j  Study,  140. 

Peabody,  Elizabeth,  29,  54,  145. 

Phelps- Ward,  Mrs.,  91,  125,  139. 

Phillips,  Wendell,  49,  85. 

Pittsfield,  190-193. 

Plymouth,  144. 

Prescott,  W.  H.,  86. 

Ripley,  Ezra,  28,  33,  34. 

Ripley,  Mrs.  Samuel,  29,  35,  48. 

Salem,  128. 

Sanborn,  F.  B.,  20-24. 

Scarlet  Letter,  95,  135,  136. 

Sedgwick,  Catherine,  176,  189,  190. 

Septimius  Felton,  55,  60-65. 

Silas  Lapham,  97,  99. 

Sleepy  Hollow,  75-80. 

Sprague,  Charles,  86. 

Stockbridge,  189;  Bowl,  176,  181  ;  Glen, 
Stone,  J.  A.,  25. 
Sudbury,  118. 

Summer  School  of  Philosophy,  55,  56. 

222 


Index 


Sumner,  Charles,  85,  92,  124. 
Swinburne,  A.  C,  210. 
Tanglewood,  183. 
Thaxter,  Celia,  91,  139,  140. 

Thoreau,  19,  22,  27,  33,  41,  50,  63,  76,  169,  174  j 

Abodes,  20,  245  Walden,  68-74. 
Ticknor,  George,  94. 
Walden  Pond,  68. 
Wayside,  The,  58. 
Wayside  Inn,  The,  118. 
Webster,  Daniel,  19}  Marshfield,  142. 
Wheildon,  William,  25. 
Whipple,  E.  P.,  66,  76,  91. 
Whitefield,  George,  140. 

Whitman,  Walt,   50  j   A  Day  with,  201,  Leaves  of 

Grass,  212,  213. 
Whittier,  90,  93}  Homes,  122,  124,  138}  Scenes,  122, 

123,  124,  126  j  Sepulchre,  127. 
Williamstown,  173. 
Willis,  N.  P.,  84,  115. 
Woodworth  ;  Old  Oaken  Bucket,  141. 
Zenobia,  40,  150. 


THE  END. 


223 


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GETTY  CENTER  LIBRARY 


3  3125  00031  1536 


